The beautiful indifferent
by Noah Sila
Summary: A take on the individual experiences that wove the story as we know it, through the eyes and voices of main and secondary characters. What Shepard did, what she didn't do, who she refused or failed to be, and the meaning others ascribed to her presence in their lives. FemShep/Liara - Rated M for language/violence/sex
1. Prologue

**The beautiful indifferent**

**Prologue (Normandy)**

* * *

_The others are asleep. I am tired as well, but I can't stop looking at it. I wish I could believe that at long last, we shall meet those who came before **(1)**. We cannot come any closer until the Matriarchs give us clearance. They will want to send in more ships before allowing us to explore further; perhaps they will require a Gathering. They would be right to do so, but such things take time. I grow restless and foolish. The floating city feels very still from where I stand. We've been stationed in orbit for five days, and have seen no ship come in or out. I am afraid that it is empty. We have so much to learn, so much to see. Let it not be empty._

**_From the _****Journals_ of Matriarch Dilinaga (_ca. _581 BCE)_**

**_(1)_**_ First designation of the Protheans._

* * *

"Jump complete."

Shepard's eyes fell upon the pilot's hands, his fingers dancing across the virtual command panels surrounding him. A pianist. How much work, how much talent, how much luck to end up in this seat, at the helm of the Alliance Navy's most advanced stealth ship? She should know. She was part of the crew, now. But her nomination had little to do with skill and dedication, and everything to do with a reputation blown out of proportion by a single accomplishment. _Act, don't react_, and all that jazz instructors would dish out in academies, citing her takeover of the batarian base on that little moon, years before, as an example… it wasn't her story anymore, it was theirs, to rewrite as they saw fit. She'd never been able to tell that story the way they expected her to, anyway, translating that mess into the acceptable language of tactics and troop movements. Her original report had been practically blank. Her comm. link barking static and strategic jargon right in her ears had been the worst thing. She remembered the urge to turn it off and the silence that followed, sudden, almost aquatic. She'd moved forward to the sound of her own breath coming in, coming out, how it had accelerated, slowed, deepened. The violence had barely touched her, like staring at the sun. Then, decorations, commendations, special forces. The Normandy.

The ship's speakers crackled briefly overhead, giving way to the Captain's voice. "_Tell Commander Shepard to meet me in the comm. room for a debriefing._"

"You get that, Commander?" the pilot asked, turning around in his seat.

She gave him a nod and glanced at the other one. She saw them exchange a look before she left the cockpit.

* * *

"I'm not sure," Jenkins admitted. "If one of them goes rogue, I guess they just send another Spectre after him."

Karin Chakwas smiled, shaking her head. "Somebody's been watching too many spy vids," she said, her eyes on the silhouette coming their way. "Commander," she added with a slight bow of the head. Jenkins saluted stiffly.

"Doctor," the Commander replied as she walked past to enter the comm. room. Karin watched her go. When Commander Shepard had arrived aboard the Normandy, less than two days before, the crew's curiosity was palpable. It was short-lived, however, as it quickly became apparent that the Butcher of Torfan wasn't the expected authority figure, but a pensive young woman who obviously had no interest in living up to anything.

"See, I told you, Doctor, something's not right. The Commander wouldn't be all geared up for a simple shakedown run."

"You sound a little too hopeful."

Jenkins scratched the back of his neck, smiling. "Well, I've spent my whole life on Eden Prime. I love it, but even paradise gets boring, if you see what I mean."

"I think I do. It reminds me of a certain someone," Karin answered. "Long ago," she added when she saw the bemused look on the young soldier's face. He had no idea what she was talking about. "For someone aspiring to become such a fine sleuth, you should hone your people-reading skills, Corporal," she sighed. _Or maybe I'm older than I thought_. "I'm going back to the medical bay. Should you discover the truth behind that suspicious shakedown cruise, I'm counting on you to tell me first."

"Will do, ma'am," Jenkins promised with a gallant bow.

_Ma'am._ Karin headed down the stairs leading to the second deck. _There comes a time when the beauty of a woman makes her more respectable than desirable. So soon?_ As she entered the empty infirmary, she caught sight of her own, slender shadow. What did they see in her now, all these young, eager faces? Someone to confide in? A mother? No one?

Over the past week, she had had to perform checkups on the majority of the newly constituted crew. That meant seeing more of a person than they were usually willing to let on, how comfortable they were with their own body, what silent stories were written on their skin. Jenkins had been the first to get his checkup. Handsome and full of life, he resembled the kind of boys Karin used of be drawn to like a seed to water and sunlight. She didn't believe that her being older implied that she should only be attracted to men her own age. And yet, none of the recruits she had examined had ignited anything more than a few sparks within her, instantly gone, and born not out of desire, but of the fear of aging, of that growing gap between what she felt and what she saw in the mirror.

And others, too, were magnifying mirrors of sorts – when looking into their eyes, one often hoped or feared to reach a measure of truth, or a radiant lie that would at last tell them, _this is what the world sees, this is who you are, and you are whole_. But Karin was tired of seeing herself, that fragmented image she failed to recognize, in others' eyes. Meeting Commander Shepard should have been a restful experience: the woman reflected nothing, gave nothing back. Instead, it had only been disquieting. Karin was busy unpacking brand new sheets for the beds in the infirmary when she first laid eyes on the Commander, who was coming for her checkup. There was something insolent and withdrawn about her, as though her burdens had been laid down a long time before. She filled space with her own absence. Karin hadn't been able to adjust to her, and a tense exchange had followed.

* * *

No sign of Anderson. The Spectre was alone, facing the crepuscular landscape displayed on the wide holo screen. Shepard took a few steps into the room and saw Kryik's head turn slightly, but he didn't look at her.

"Commander." His voice had a metallic, artificial quality that made her shiver. "I had hoped I would get a chance to talk to you before Captain Anderson arrives." She didn't say anything, and after a while, he turned around fully. His white facial markings flashed against the room's cold light and against his own, dark skin, bringing a discordant, tribal note to the Normandy's rational layout. "Do you know why we've come here?"

"So that you could follow me around?" Shepard let out casually, watching his mandibles twitch. She'd seen the way he looked at her, as if searching for something. To try and gauge whether she could live up to her own legend, she suspected.

"And can you tell me why Eden Prime is best suited for this?"

She didn't answer, studying his armor. The collar was glowing red, light bouncing off his head plates. Having to turn it off manually during infiltration-based missions seemed a rather impractical necessity. If this light was a key component, why wasn't it concealed from the get-go? It was beautiful, though.

"We're not here for a shakedown run, and the reason for my presence has little to do with the Normandy." He paused. She had heard the crew speculate about the true motives behind their coming to Eden Prime with a Spectre on board, under the command of a man whose reputation seemed out of proportion with the triviality of the task. Silence stretched out. She could barely see Kryik's emerald eyes, dark and deeply embedded in his skull, much less interpret his expression. Her own eyes slowly detached themselves from his face, reaching further behind him, towards the screen. Eden Prime. Such a sky.

"This is a covert-pickup of the utmost importance, Commander, and you will be in charge of it. Your Captain will fill you in on the details. If I am here today, it is because the Council wishes me to assess your candidacy for the Spectres."

_Oh God._ Her stomach tightened in anticipation. "The Council, or the Alliance?"

"I took the liberty to put your name forward."

_Torfan._ It had to be because of Torfan. Kryik started pacing around her, slowly, but as restlessly as her mind was racing. She could feel it. "Should you accept, I will take it upon myself to evaluate you." He stopped, facing her, and this time she could see his eyes move all over her face, betraying an agitation hidden by the stillness of his body. She stared back. He was close enough that she had to raise her head to meet his gaze. "You're unfocused, but I think you have what it takes, Shepard. With time and proper training, you-"

They both turned towards the entrance of the room when Anderson came in. Kryik took a step back. "Captain, I just informed the Commander of the Council's projects regarding her candidacy."

Anderson nodded, coming to a stop, his hands behind his back. The bearing of one who was in command and whose presence didn't require petty tricks to be overwhelming. He was looking at her. They were both looking at her.

"This is a rare opportunity. Do you realize how big a step it would be for the Alliance, and even beyond, for humanity, if you were to become the first human Spectre?" Anderson asked.

Her heart was pounding hard. "My being human isn't the Alliance's passport to galactic politics." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Kryik's mandibles flit about. Could turians converse using mandible moves?

"You may not be known for your patriotism, Shepard, but you have to understand that there is a lot at stake. Your personal merits may have led you here, and they play a large part in your being considered a potential candidate for Special Tactics, but there is a bigger picture. The Alliance wants more say with the Council, and whether you like it or not, the political consequences of your nomination will be far-reaching and long-lasting for humanity," Anderson declared.

_And once humanity gets its precious seat on the Council, what more will you want? _But she needed a way out. She had done it once before, latching onto a life-altering opportunity, bracing herself for the worst, receiving only the best. Growing up on the streets should have been the most efficient school to learn how to forgo the luxury of indecisiveness, to sharpen your choices with greed, desperation or healthy ambition. But she hadn't learned. Leaves in the wind. Catch the wind, then.

"What do you want me to do?"

* * *

"_Yes?" Karin ended up asking the young woman standing in the doorway, after a few awkward seconds._

"_Captain Anderson told me you were expecting me for a check-up," the young woman said. _A smoker's voice? Or just a sore throat?_ She had seen this face somewhere. Oh. Right._

"_Are you Commander Shepard?"_

_Before the woman could answer, Anderson's voice popped out of the speakers on Karin's desk. "_Dr. Chakwas, Anderson here."

"_Yes, Captain?" she answered, eying her visitor, who was putting down her bag._

"Commander Shepard has arrived sooner than expected, I've sent her down to get her check-up, but it can wait if you're busy_."_

"_Not at all. As a matter of fact, she's already here."_

"Ah, very well then, I'll give you access to her medical record right away._"_

_The Commander shifted her weight on her right leg, taking in her surroundings. Her fair hair seemed just long enough to be tied back, currently hanging loose in a very unmilitary fashion. _

"_Thank you, Captain," Karin said, and the comm. light went off._ "_Welcome aboard, Commander." A polite nod from Shepard. "As you already know, I'm the Chief Medical Officer here. If you'd like to go unpack your luggage while I'm going through your record, feel free," she offered._

"_No locker has been assigned to me yet," the woman said with a hint of a smile. Ironic? Perhaps it was her voice giving off that impression._

"_It would seem you took everyone off guard, Commander," Karin smiled back, leaning over her computer to log in to the crew's medical database. "Your file isn't available yet, but we'll begin anyway. Is there anything I should know that is not in your record? Something recent, or that was deemed trivial but you think might be important?"_

_The Commander sat on the edge of a bed, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear with a graceful gesture that contrasted her stern military outfit. Glancing on the side, Karin saw Shepard's file pop onto the screen, but chose to remain still. "I haven't had my period for four months."_

_Karin blinked twice, her face otherwise neutral._ _"I see. May I ask why you didn't mention this to your previous medical officer?" It was only when the woman looked straight at her that she noticed her eyes. The dim artificial lights made it difficult to determine their colour. Pale grey, perhaps. Ash blond hair, complexion, eyes, all about her seemed on the verge of fading, except her voice._

"_It comes and goes, I'm used to it."_

How about the day you wake up with a belly the size of Jump Zero, will you be used to it? _"With all due respect, Commander, I would prefer that you do not try to decide what should or shouldn't be in your medical record. That being said, do you have any idea as to what might be causing these frequent interruptions?" Karin inquired, arms crossed._

"_As I said," Shepard let out quietly, and Karin felt the air grow heavy around them, "I've always had irregular periods. I can't think of any specific cause."_

_Karin forced herself to relax. She was imagining it, the tension, influenced by what she already knew of the young woman, prone to search for traces of the ruthlessness she was renowned for. But there was _something_. Perhaps the echo of crossing a certain line, the Torfan line? Or of going through the N7 program? Or even before, during that rough childhood in Earth's slums? _Stop it, you don't know her.

"_Perhaps you're right. I'll look into your file for any dietary supplement or medication that could be responsible, though. And I'm going to have to run a CAT scan, Commander."_

_Shepard stood up, which Karin took as a sign of consent. "You can undress here or in this room over there if you need some privacy, but I'm afraid it's full of supplies I haven't had time to unpack yet. And you can keep your underwear," Karin added, remembering a rather embarrassing moment not two days before. "But there is one thing I need to ask you first. Is there a chance you might be pregnant?"_

_Karin wouldn't have asked if it were up to her, she'd have let the CAT scan tell her everything she needed to know. But she was expected to do things by the book. The only time Karin had examined a soldier with child had turned out to be a bad case of pregnancy denial. There were some situations for which the procedure had nothing to offer._

* * *

"_There is nothing for you here."_

"_Nothing for me out there either."_

"_You don't know that. You're strong, you would make a great soldier if only you could-"_

"_What, learn to obey? Learn to salute, to crawl in the mud because I'm ordered to? I'll pass, thank- shit, what'd you do that for?"_

"_You _will_ join the military even if I have to drag you there myself! What do you think is going to happen if you stay? You're sixteen and picking up fights everyday-"_

"_So now it's wrong to defen-"_

"_Be quiet! Listen to me very carefully. If you stay here, you will end up a thug, a drunk, a pathetic gun for hire, and you'll get knifed in the back like an animal because you picked up one fight too many. One way or the other, you'll have to crawl. Better to yomp in the mud knowing a few hours later, you'll be sleeping soundly in a warm bed. So you and your damned pride will do as I say, you will contact the recruiters, you will enlist, you will get out of here and become someone. Because I expect nothing less from you."_

He was drifting in and out of so many memories lately. It was catching up to him. Bathed in Eden Prime's evening light, Nihlus watched Shepard put on her helmet, the two soldiers under her command standing behind her. He had taken an interest in her after the Torfan massacre, and had grown somewhat fond of that human, for foolish reasons. He had set Shepard's candidacy for the Spectres in motion and obtained the Council's permission to contact the Alliance to get access to Shepard's file. Beyond her obvious potential, it was a part of himself that Nihlus was reminded of. Growing up like there was no tomorrow, fighting to be acknowledged, fighting for nothing, fighting to fight. Maybe he was just projecting his own story upon her.

He felt his mandibles twitch as the ghost sensation of a stinging slap shot through his mind. He wondered what had driven Shepard to join the military. Certainly no profound belief in serving the Systems Alliance, that much he was sure of. To escape the slums of her home planet? Nihlus hadn't joined the turian army out of desperation for a better life. Only out of love. So much love that even after all these years, becauseof all these years, he had to choke back a sigh at the thought of his mother. Shepard had no family, and gangs weren't known for pushing their members into the military's arms. Why, then?

"_Approaching drop point one_," came the helmsman's voice.

"Nihlus, are you coming with us?" Jenkins yelled over the deafening roar of the engines.

The Commander turned her head in his direction. Nihlus couldn't see her eyes through her visor, but didn't avert his gaze.

" No, I'll scout out ahead. I work faster on my own."

He ran towards the exit, and after the dim lights of the Normandy's interior, he felt his eyes respond to the dusk of Eden Prime the way they did to a bright morning.


	2. Eden Prime 1

**The Beautiful Indifferent**

**Chapter 01 (Eden Prime, 1/2)**

* * *

_**Prayer for a daughter**_

_Whatever you do,_

_We will love you._

_Should you do nothing,_

_We will love you._

_For what you embrace,_

_We will love you._

_For what you discard,_

_We will love you._

_For wanting to grow,_

_We will love you._

_For wanting an end,_

_We will love you._

_For your life,_

_We offer ours._

_**Translator's note:** This archaic prayer was found carved in each of the recently discovered sunken temples of Eiluthia. Little remains of the cult to which these grounds were dedicated, which does not seem to have been practiced anywhere else on Thessia, and likely declined some forty thousand years before the rise of siari pantheism. The Prayer for a daughter appears to have been a prominent part of a birth ritual._

* * *

Kaidan knelt down by the charred body, its limbs twisted at impossible angles, and his hand came to rest upon what had been a shoulder. "What the hell happened here," he murmured as he gave it a soft squeeze. A layer of flesh crumbled into ashes under his gloved fingers. The smell of burnt meat sneaked into his suit's air-processing system, so subtly he didn't notice it until his empty stomach growled. He had to stifle a retch. He had never thrown up into his helmet before he could take it off, but he had heard stories of wounded or unconscious soldiers drowning in their own puke amidst the frantic indifference of combat.

Something entered his field of vision, brushing against the grass with the swishing sound of a helium balloon. Kaidan froze and glanced up, only to find himself face to face with a grotesque, floating red-eyed tumor. "Holy shit!" he shouted as he fell backwards, crushing the burnt corpse and wincing when the carbonized skull gave way under his elbow. The thing was blinking gently, one eye at a time, bulbous, pulsing growths protruding from its body. They stared at each other for a few seconds, then it floated away, its thin tendrils trailing on the ground.

"It's just a gas bag, they're harmless unless they pop in your face," Jenkins explained.

"I see," Kaidan breathed out, noticing a few of the creatures drifting this way and that above the stagnant water of the nearby pond.

"You're sitting on someone, Lieutenant."

Kaidan looked at Jenkins. Was the rookie trying to be funny? He seemed serious enough as he offered Kaidan a hand to help him up, staring at what used to be a body, and was now an indescribable mess. "Thanks. You all right?" Kaidan asked, suppressing a shiver of disgust and unease as he took out his pistol to brush off some of the dust _– body parts –_ it was partially covered in.

"Yeah. It's just… I don't know, I didn't expect my first assignment to take place here, under those circumstances. I mean, I know this place," he added in a whisper.

"I'm sorry, Jenkins. We'll find out who's responsible for this," Kaidan assured, and as Shepard walked past them, holstering her weapon, he looked at her.

"Focus on the beacon," she said evenly, her voice muffled by her helmet, probably thinking he was asking for some sort of confirmation.

Kaidan wasn't. He had only looked at her because they'd been on Eden Prime for a couple of minutes, and so far she hadn't said anything. Perhaps she was the kind of officer who preferred to assess the situation silently before giving her men their orders, but communication was essential, especially for a covert operation in unfamiliar territory, likely patrolled by unknown hostiles. Besides, she wasn't paid to be nice, that much Kaidan knew, but it was the kid's home planet, couldn't she show some consideration? He watched her walk on ahead. Maybe she genuinely didn't care. At first, he had thought she was distant because having gone through what she had was enough to make anybody lose interest in chit-chat and casual befriending. That she was blunt because she didn't see the point in wrapping facts into pleasantries. That her unconventional demeanor was the trademark spirit of initiative of an N7, bringing fluidity to military protocol when the mission demanded it. He was still looking forward to working under command, but the more he observed her, the harder it became for him to judge her character. No, she wasn't exactly distant, or blunt, or tactically independent. She was something else he wasn't sure he wanted to take a closer look at, something in-between and slippery. Or perhaps it was simple, right in front of his face, so big he couldn't see it. And it grated on his nerves, not to be able to reconcile those conflicting impressions he got from her.

They passed two other corpses. Kaidan averted his eyes, letting them drift off in the distance. The view stretched on lazily, blending with the dusk, a lone tower rising here and there above the low plateaux. They'd been climbing up a hill for a while now, their walk slow and steady, hypnotic, prompting Kaidan's mind to wander in a grey area between effort and thought. He ended up bumping into Jenkins, who had stopped walking. "Sorry," he said distractedly, noticing Shepard wasn't moving either. She was standing still at a turn of the dirt path they had been following. Kaidan couldn't see what she was looking at because of an uneven rock wall blocking his view, but when she unclipped her assault rifle and slowly circled the boulder, he drew out his pistol. Jenkins did the same and they caught up with Shepard, who was crouched by a rocky ledge, observing the empty slope before them. And then Kaidan heard it. A faint, buzzing noise.

Without turning, Shepard made a vague gesture which probably meant "take cover on my left", but Kaidan chose not to acknowledge it. With his body tensing in anticipation, alert, her lack of professionalism was getting irritating and if she wanted something done, then hell, she would either order it the proper way, or do it herself. However, the burst of satisfaction he got from his little bout of insubordination was short-lived when Jenkins obeyed and, instead of rolling out from behind the rock to quickly find cover elsewhere, got up in the open. Kaidan almost told him to crouch, but decided against it. It was Shepard's mission. Jenkins was obviously doing his best not to mess up his first assignment, trying to live up to the Commander's expectations. Only Kaidan wasn't sure she had any. But no matter, the kid admired her, having been fed countless tales of her legendary feats on Torfan as part of his training. Had Kaidan been younger, he would have heard the same stories back at the academy and would probably have been in awe as well. He was, to a certain extent. But her methods were disconcerting.

His train of thought was interrupted by the drastic amplification of the hum that had so far been low enough to fade into the wind. It happened fast. What looked like a surveillance drone flew out of the distant trees, firing a volley of flashing bullets, and before the words to urge Jenkins to get out of the way could form in Kaidan's throat, the young soldier convulsed, nailed to an invisible wall, and an exhalation that wasn't quite a grunt or a moan escaped his lips, ringing in Kaidan's ears through his radio. He fell limply and stopped moving, the firing ceased, and all was silent again.

* * *

"_For the last time, warp it!"_

"_But sir, I don't know how to do it!"_

"_Shut up. If I tell you to do it, it means you're capable of it. So move your ass and give me a damn warp, or I'll have you do so many push-ups your arms will fall off."_

_For fuck's sake, if a warp was what that dogface of a turian wanted, he'd give him one. Kaidan grounded himself, conjured up all the biotic energy he could muster, and tried to perform the mnemonic they had been taught in the morning. But it was so complicated. He felt his energy go somewhere, but nothing happened. And then he almost fainted from the brutal pain that gripped his intestines, like his insides were being shredded, melting his surrounding into blurry shades of grey. Clutching his stomach, he fell on his knees, then face down on the floor, gasping for air in uncontrollable sobs._

"_Can't say I expected much of you to begin with, Alenko, but you outdid yourself this time. Someone take that joke of a biotic to the infirmary. Move it!"_

* * *

He tried crawling out to drag Jenkins back to their hiding spot and give him some first aid, but the drone fired a salvo and Kaidan had to throw himself behind the rock again. Shepard, her back resting against the boulder in an oddly relaxed attitude, appeared deeply concentrated. Kaidan waited, crouched in front of her, peering above the ledge from time to time, otherwise trying to discern her eyes through her visor. She was very still. He could feel his heart pounding erratically, blood pumping all around his eyes and a vague, throbbing pain in his temples. She was about to do something.

She ducked out, fast and precise, and fired a single round. Silence echoed. Kaidan watched the drone as Shepard dropped down behind the rock once more. She had missed completely. He looked at her again. He didn't understand her strategy. He realized she had none when she laid her rifle down on the ground and took off her helmet, resting her head back against the stone. She was breathing heavily, but silently.

"Shit!" Kaidan exclaimed when the drone fired abruptly, the impact burning a hole in the ground not too far from his left foot. "Commander, we have to do something," he said, trying to keep the urgency in his voice at a reasonable level. He glanced at Jenkins' body, then at Shepard's face. She was so pale.

* * *

oOo

* * *

"No way."

"And how am I supposed to clean that wound if you don't take it off?" Chloe asked without impatience.

"I just want an injection."

"Of what? No injection would be as effective as medi-gel, which you've already used. If you won't take your suit off, the best I can offer you is a bed to rest, and some painkillers if it hurts."

"No, I have to go. Just give me whatever pain meds you can spare, and I'll be on my way. I have money, I can pay."

"That's not the problem," Chloe said as she went to gather some supplies. "Medi-gel is only a temporary solution. After a while, trust me, you'll be safer out in the open than inside that suit with a festering wound," she stated evenly, putting some tablets and a pack of medi-gel in a little plastic bag. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the quarian massage her injured shoulder carefully, head lowered. She sounded rather young, in a hurry, and obviously wanted no questions asked.

"How long do I have before it gets infected?"

"I don't know. A few days, at best." Chloe put the bag on the bed the quarian was sitting on. "All right. If it hurts, take two of those, and wait at least four hours before you take more. You're not registered here, so I can't give you a prescription for a refill. You'll have to get some proper care eventually, and the more you wait, the more painful it will be. And at that point you will likely lose your arm." At that, the quarian's head snapped up, and through the opaque visor, Chloe could discern vague, slanting eyes, and light bouncing on the bridge of a nose. The features seemed familiar, and yet there was something irremediably alien in that face. Chloe stared back calmly, not letting on the slight feeling of uneasiness that oppressed her chest. Sometimes, when treating a non-human patient, their otherness would dawn on her briefly. They all had to make it work, to conjugate all these species in as harmonious a whole as possible, but they were different. You could get along with them, sometimes intimate, or even oblivious to what, in the beginning, felt like the elephant in the middle of the room; over time, places like the Citadel made you feel part of a larger, relatively homogenous community, racial dissimilarities turned into cultural ones, a veneer of urban indifference keeping it all together. "Of course, you could stay, remove that suit and trust your immunizations, I could patch you up and you would be fine. I've had quarian patients before," Chloe went on, leaning against the bedside table.

Silence lazed about for a few seconds.

"I don't have much time."

Chloe held back a smile. "I'll make it quick. Lie down." The quarian complied, hissing in pain, as Chloe proceeded to wash her hands in the nearby sink, all the way up to her elbows, then rinsing the soap from forearm to fingertips, never the other way around.

"My name's Tali."

With some patients, prying and probing led nowhere, and whatever they needed to share would come to the surface of its own accord, bubbling up in short, worried or weary sentences. The truth was, Chloe was past caring, but that wasn't the point. The point was kindness. She dried her hands with a clean paper towel, dropped it in the trashcan and grabbed a tray to put her instruments on. "That's a pretty name. Does it mean anything?"

An amused giggle, muffled by whatever contraption the quarian was using to breathe, filled the room for an instant. "If it means anything, I wasn't told. Considering the kind of father I have, I'm probably better off not knowing anyway."

Chloe chose not to leave it at that, and focused on picking what she needed from the cupboard, arranging everything neatly. She came back to her patient and adjusted the height of the bed, careful not to jolt her needlessly. She saw her glance at the tray, or at least turn her head towards it. Chloe stayed still for a moment, looking at the quarian's mask. "I'm going to take off your helmet now, Tali," she said quietly.

"Okay. Wait! What if somebody comes in?"

"Well, they come in."

A shaky intake of breath.

* * *

oOo

* * *

_And now?_ Shepard looked at her hand. It was resting on her rifle, casually. You didn't need to stroke your cat's back, you just left your hand there while it slept. Or something. Holding on to her own thoughts was like cupping water in her hands, it just slipped away. There was so much at stake. Confusedly, she had always believed that her life wasn't all that she was. That there would be a calling. Was that it, in Kryik's eyes, in Kryik's words? Her calling? _Special Tactics and Reconnaissance_. She had so little to offer.

She took off her helmet. The ventilation system was freezing, she needed some air. _Okay. _Her helmet escaped her loose fingers, rolling down gently until a stone stopped it. _Okay._ She started when the drone fired again.

"Shit!" Alenko yelled, jumping aside and crouching some more to stay out of the drone's line of sight. "Commander, we have to do something," he said, obviously on edge. She saw him glance at Jenkins' body. She blinked, the warmth of the setting sun spreading through her muscles. What time was it on this planet? She had seen the same helpless look of comprehension Alenko was giving her now, on the faces of others. When they understood she wouldn't help, wouldn't protect. Her heart rate grew calm. _Okay_.

She turned, grabbed the edge of the rock that had been shielding them, pulled hard to spring out of cover, and ran.

"What the hell are you- Commander, no!" She heard Alenko shout, his voice drowning far behind as she fired up a biotic barrier. The drone locked in on her immediately, the sound of multiple impacts muffled like bullets through water.

* * *

Kaidan couldn't move, wasn't thinking of moving, as he watched Shepard bolt her way up the slope, not even looming to avoid enemy fire. He saw her barrier shimmer in the light for a fraction of a second, and he was so tense that a sharp pain shot through his neck. _She's going to die. I don't understand._ A memory briefly echoed in his mind, of this girl at BAaT, who had let herself wither away quietly. He remembered her, like a skinny ghost lost in her bed, her eyes elsewhere and burning with life and fever. He had wanted to ask her how dying could possibly be an act of resistance, or if she was so broken she couldn't push on a little further, in case things got better in a minute, an hour, a day. But he hadn't, because against such resolve, the only thing to do was lay down your arms, maybe hold her hand. Only he hadn't done that either, because her body couldn't even bear the weight of bed sheets by then, so he'd been afraid to hurt her, and also, they weren't friends, and when you were a self-conscious fifteen-year-old teen, you didn't just… Besides, she was just a dying girl, she was gone already, and two days after this she stopped breathing anyway, and _what the fuck is she doing,_ he thought as Shepard, who had run up all the way to the drone, threw herself at it to grab its cannon.

She was lifted up into the air when the drone started spinning faster and faster to get rid of her. No weapon drawn, no helmet. An assault drone. Kaidan glanced at Jenkins again. The kid was dead, but he should go and check up on him anyway. But his eyes were drawn back to Shepard, swinging in the air. He was beginning to think that this insane strategy was in fact preventing the drone from firing on her quite effectively, when it managed to slam her violently against the ground. She lost her grip and, in the evening stillness, Kaidan could hear the groan she let out when the impact knocked the air out of her. Finally, reflexes kicked in and he whipped out his pistol, intending to shoot the drone before it could take advantage of Shepard's position, but the second it took him to adjust his aim was enough for her to stagger to her feet and shake off disorientation, only to throw herself at the drone again, preventing Kaidan from shooting.

"Commander, move, you're gonna get yourself killed!" he yelled.

She grabbed the canon again, sending the drone into a renewed bout of spinning, but when it tried to lift her up a second time, she stayed more or less grounded and used its own momentum to swing it around before smashing it brutally against a rock, again and again. Silence descended upon the path. Shepard straightened up slowly, rubbing her lower back after unclipping her pistol, where it must have bitten hard into her flesh when she was thrown down. She was panting, her eyes on the drone's remains. She seemed to study it for a moment, turning it over, then laid it on the ground and walked down the slope at a brisk pace.

"Are you all right, Commander?" Kaidan asked, his voice hollow, violence still ringing in his ears.

She picked up her rifle and was about to answer when their radio spat some static. It gave way to Nihlus' voice, rendered even more artificial by the low quality of the transmission. "_Got some burned out buildings here Shepard. Lot of bodies. I'm gonna check it out, I'll try to catch up with you at the dig site_." Shepard holstered her weapon and walked away, her helmet under her arm.

"Commander, shouldn't we check on Jenkins?"

She turned around, still walking, running a hand through her hair to get it out of her eyes. She was slightly out of breath. "Isn't that what _you_ do?"

_What? _His stomach tightened. He wasn't scared exactly, but he was beginning to feel the unknown creep up on him. He had no idea what was going to happen. They weren't a team, and the worst part was that he should have seen it coming. _She gets the job done_. In fact, he was probably crowding her. Spectre material all right, if the rumors flying around in the Normandy were true. He was angry, but not at her. You didn't get angry at someone for being indifferent to a young teammate's death, or to you. What could possibly be said or done around such people? He was on his own.

He crossed the distance separating him from Jenkins and knelt down. The boy was gone, of course. Kaidan checked his pulse a little longer than necessary, closed dead eyelids over dead eyes, got up and followed Shepard.

* * *

Ashley Williams of the 212, as she activated her assault rifle for one last, desperate stand, could only focus her efforts on a single task: not to shit herself. Ironically enough, she'd been planning to go to the bathroom as soon as she got her patrol over with, when all hell broke loose. She had gone through long fights during training sessions, and had thus experienced the inconvenience of needing the bathroom at the worst possible moment. It had been an irritating, manageable itch. Right now, maybe it was the fear, or the adrenaline, or the thirst, but the stomach cramps were mind-numbing. She briefly considered the unthinkable, because there was no one around to be disgusted anyway, but the mere idea of a rescue team finding her corpse bathing in its own productions was enough to make her straighten up and lock each orifice in her body. Not that anyone was coming, she suspected.

Oh Lord, the stress, the exhaustion, Ashley could deal with. But when those things had impaled Bhatia on a spike so brutally the private's spine had popped out, the horror welling up in Ashley's bowels had been so violent it had needed immediate exit. She mentally slapped herself out of it, but no matter how hard she tried to concentrate, her mind would sneak its way out of the here and now. And that horrible sound coming from goodness knew where. She wasn't even certain it had stopped, it still rang in her ears like… like nothing she had ever heard before.

They were coming. _Get a grip, Ash, get a grip_. She tore herself away from the rock she'd stayed glued to for the past twenty seconds, and boy, did her mind roam fast and far every moment of it, and spinning around, the weight of her rifle falling into place perfectly, she was ready to aim and shoot and make it count. But before the sight that greeted her, her grip on the weapon loosened and she just watched this tall _being_ – _alien wearing advanced, cybernetic armor? Synthetic? –_ cradling a man's body against its chest, touching his head as the poor guy whimpered in fear and-

"Jesus Christ," Ashley whispered as a spike burst from under the man's body and impaled him hard and high, sending him several metres above the ground. It was grotesque. Blood started trickling down the spike in slow, almost sensual rivulets, and Ashley stood there, her hands cold and sweaty, nauseated, weak, enthralled.

The thing turned its flashlight head her way, purring its discordant lullaby like an electronic cat. Ashley knew she should do something. It took a step towards her but all she could do was blink at it, until _something_ bolted into her field of vision and snapped her out of her stupor.

The Alliance armor was what she identified first, then a flash of hair. The woman ran past her and threw herself at the thing, knocked it down, grabbed its head and rammed it into the ground. Ashley's reflexes kicked in and she got ready to blow its head off as soon as an opening presented itself. Relief washed over her harshly, and she had to swallow the lump forming in her throat. She'd been spared. Somebody up there had decided her time wasn't up just yet. Unmoving, her index hovering over the trigger, she caught the glimmer of a biotic barrier around the woman as the synthetic tried to writhe its way out her grasp. There was something disturbing about this erratic rodeo, maybe because it was so quiet, because of the rhythmic hammering of an artificial head into the ground. And then the girl – _woman_ – pulled out her pistol, shielded her eyes with her forearm and fired at point blank range. She let out a pained hiss when shards of plastic or whatever it was the synthetic was made of went flying to her face, but it did the trick, and the thing stopped struggling, its high-tech chirping slowly spiraling down into silence. Until then, Ashley hadn't even realized she wasn't wearing a helmet.

"Are you okay?" said a voice behind her.

Startled, Ashley turned around to find herself face-to-face with another marine. She looked around to see if more of them were coming. "I… yeah, I'm okay, thanks for the rescue," she answered, glancing at the woman who had stood up and taken off one of her gloves to rub her eyes. Ashley noticed the N7 logo on her armor. _Shit_. She straightened up instantly. "Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams of the 212, ma'am."

"At ease."

Seconds passed. _And?_

"Do you want medi-gel, Commander?" The guy asked, sounding a bit weary. "Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko," he added with a nod aimed at Ashley.

"I'm all right," said the N7 woman, putting her glove back on, her head raised towards the impaled man.

_Commander. Commander Shepard_. It dawned on Ashley when she reconciled that face with the one that had frequently made the news a few years back. She realized with a pang of self-consciousness that she was holding her rifle like a rookie. Not that the woman seemed to care, she hadn't even spared Ashley a glance. Their was blood on her face, tiny droplets against pale skin. "Sitrep, Chief," she finally ordered in that weird, slightly broken voice Ashley didn't remember from the vids.

Her existence thus acknowledged, Ashley gladly broke the uncomfortable silence that had been stretching on. "Yes, ma'am. We were patrolling the perimeter when a huge mothership, a dreadnought I think, descended on us out of nowhere and landed near the spaceport. Then an army of these things poured out of it, at firFst I thought some of them might be aliens in armor but," she motioned towards the smashed carcass, "I'm beginning to think they could be… well, they're obviously synthetics and I'm thinking they might be geth, their-"

"Geth?" the Lieutenant interrupted. "What makes you think that?"

"This, for starters," said Ashley, pointing at the spike, "because I don't know about you, but I've never heard of regular combat mechs skewering people like this. They're no ordinary synthetics, they're… I mean, they decimated my unit before we could even get off a distress call. We were told to secure the beacon but we never even made it to the dig site. Well I did, but the beacon wasn't there anymore, and the only thing waiting for me was a bunch of drones. I managed to put them down but then, this one came and… you know the rest. I don't think anyone else made it. I don't know about the researchers who set up camp up there, though."

"Do you have any idea who moved the beacon away from the dig site?" Shepard asked, looking at her directly for the first time. Ashley was a bit taken aback by her eyes. They were colorless, swaying between grey and blue, catching the luminosity of neither.

"No, it might have been the scientists, but we're just grunts here, nobody tells us anything. I just know that some Prothean device was unearthed a couple of days ago by the workers digging to extend the monorail. And before we knew it, we'd been reassigned to secure the dig site."

"Where's the research camp?"

Ashley became aware that she was staring at a tiny pearl of blood on Shepard's cheek and had to tear her eyes off of it. "The dig site's at the far end of this trench is the dig site, then there's a ramp winding up to the camp, atop the ridge."

Shepard nodded and turned away, walking towards the dig site. Ashley's eyes followed her, then landed on the Lieutenant, a questioning frown creasing her brow. It wasn't supposed to be that way. The Lieutenant returned her glance with a helpless shrug, and fell in line. _Shit, so they're just gonna leave me here like a damned lamppost?_ _No way you're getting all the fun, Torfan girl, I'm coming with you_. "Commander!" she called, scurrying along to catch up with Shepard, who stopped. _Is_ _she rubbing her butt?_ _Whatever_. She needed to focus. Because there was a hell of a lot at stake, the brass was just waiting for an opportunity to jump at the throat of the latest Williams. She was screwed if she didn't make up for the fiasco of the surprise attack. "Commander, they slaughtered my unit, so if you're going after them, I want in. Please."

Shepard shook her head slightly after a second or two. "I'm not going after them, I've been sent to secure the beacon."

_Geez, her voice. _"Well, I assume you intend to take care of the ones standing in your way, and who knows how many there will be, besides, it's not like I can do anything but come along. Please, Commander." She was rewarded by a half-assed nod. Disconcerted, Ashley turned to the Lieutenant again. "Isn't she in command?" she whispered when Shepard was far enough not to overhear. "Or did you meet her on the way as well?"

"No. Our ship, the Normandy, just dropped us to get the beacon ASAP. We're part of Captain Anderson's crew, but the Commander's in charge of the mission groundside. There was another in the squad, but a drone got him."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ashley offered, noticing out of the corner of her eye that Shepard was rubbing her lower back again. Was she wounded?

"Me too, it was his first mission. Anyway, we came in with a Spectre, Nihlus Kryik. He's scouting out ahead, so here's the frequency he uses to give us feedback. Otherwise, we're on radio silence."

"Understood. Thanks, Lieutenant."

As Ashley adjusted her comm. link, she couldn't help but check out his behind, hugged close by the ridiculously tight fabric of his light armor. He looked like he was in his pajamas. She briefly wondered why she didn't seem to be able to take in the gravity of the situation, to realize that she had just watched her team get butchered, but her mind quickly fled those thoughts when she entered the right radio frequency, and a metallic voice assaulted her ears. She lowered the volume hurriedly. _"...small spaceport up ahead, I want to check it out. I'll wait for you there_."

* * *

_**From:** Leopoldine Loewy (leopoldine[dot]loewy[at]arcturus-admin[dot]mil[dot]sa)_

_**Sent:** February 14, 2183 07:49 UT_

_**To:** Ashley Williams (ashley[dot]m[dot]williams[at]edenprime[dot]mil[dot]sa)_

_**Subject:** Transfer request_

_Dear Miss Williams,_

_Thank you for your letter of February 9. After careful consideration, I regret to inform you that I am unable to grant your request to be transferred to a shipboard posting on the SSV Jagannath._

_I wish you the best of luck for your future applications,_

_Sincerely,_

_Leopoldine Loewy_

* * *

The slope was steep, and the rush of lactic acid in her muscles was urging Shepard to just take a break. _A break when I'm out cold, or a Spectre_. Restlessness and a sense of urgency were pushing her onwards. For all she knew, the beacon might not even be on the planet anymore, and if it was, Kryik would get to it first anyway. She wondered what part the little Corporal's death would play in her evaluation. If there even was an evaluation. Given the scale of this attack and the nature of the enemy, she figured her candidacy for Special Tactics wouldn't be anyone's priority. Go on, don't think about it. She silenced her inner voice by rushing ahead faster, her thighs begging for a rest. But it didn't work that way, did it? Her muscles just threw some more pain at her brain, and her mind kept on ranting.

As suddenly as it had begun, the ramp ended. Shepard had to shield her eyes for a few seconds because the plateau that opened up before her was high enough to bask in the last rays of sun. And there was the small research camp, or what was left of it. Only a couple of sheds were still standing amidst the debris, flames fluttering here and there, crates that had burst open like overloaded bellies, emptying their contents over corpses. Shepard took a few steps forward, her eyes jumping from spot to spot in search of anything that could resemble a beacon. She knew it wasn't there, otherwise Kryik would have secured it already.

"It's a good place for an ambush, keep you guard up," said the Lieutenant behind her, slightly winded from the climbing.

Shepard closed her eyes for an instant, biting her lower lip in frustration. Then the dreaded "Commander?" escaped the other one's lips. Williams, was it? She turned to the woman. "Do you want me to check the barracks?" Shepard bit her lip even harder. She couldn't deal with having to tell others what they were supposed to do. She had her own decisions to make. _My future within an hourglass_. She didn't want to be a Spectre so that she could soar on the wings of solitary glory. She just wanted a certain liberty of movement. Open spaces. But the better she dealt with teamwork, the sooner she'd be able to leave it behind.

"Go ahead."

"Yes, ma'am."

She watched the Chief jog away, then let her eyes drift off towards the spikes. Three of them this time, erected like obscene offerings to some ancient, unfathomable god. The bodies looked different, drained and stripped of all distinctive features, almost mummified, but the blood on the spikes' smooth surface was still fresh. And then one of the corpses twitched.

"They're still alive," the Lieutenant whispered, dread in his voice.

Shepard took a step back. They were all twitching now. There was no way they could still be alive, or dead with a functional nervous system allowing them to wiggle like that. She almost fell down when the spikes retracted brutally into their pedestal, corpses rolling onto the ground and stumbling to their feet like drunkards. Shepard drew out her shotgun, breathing in the earthy scents carried by the warm breeze. The Lieutenant unclipped his pistol, and she saw the Chief run back to them, her assault rifle already in her hands. She grounded herself, tension creeping up her limbs, unpleasant, sharpening her senses. _Calm down. _Sometimes, it rained for days on end back on Earth.

The corpses let out impossible shrieks, parts of them glaring in the sunlight as if they weren't entirely organic anymore. Something blue seemed to be coursing through their veins, and although they had eyeballs, their sockets looked empty.

"God help us," she heard the Chief murmur in disbelief.

Two of the corpses hurled themselves at Shepard, screeching. She took aim and fired, knocking one of them back, but the other threw its own weight forward even as it was being shot at by the Chief, and a strange growl rose from it, like something was building itself up fast within that body, sparkles of electricity beginning to sizzle all over it. The noise grew deafening and before Shepard could throw herself on the side, the corpse literally exploded, raw power cutting through her shields and shaking her body to its core. She writhed on the ground, clutching a handful of dirt hard enough to make her bones snap. She tensed to a breaking point, then fell back on the ground, limp and numb. She closed her eyes. She couldn't hear anything. Relieved of duty. Relieved.

She must have been gasping for her, because it rushed into her lungs violently. Almost blinded by sunlight, she staggered up, trying to make out shapes and sense in the blurriness before her. Everything was slow and muffled. A corpse was running her way. She gave her perceptions time to adjust, shifting her unsteady stance into the right position, and performed the mnemonic she needed. As always, she was granted a rush of biotic energy that was almost too much for her body to handle. She noticed that the Chief wasn't too far, but it didn't matter. She let it out and _pushed_.

Two bodies were thrown against the rocky ridge, and Williams screamed as she went flying in the opposite direction before crashing on a damaged shed. Shepard performed another mnemonic, some more energy surged though her, she channeled towards the corpses and it flared its way through every pore of her skin before penetrating theirs, wreaking havoc among their internal organs. Sounds and outlines were now clearer. Walking towards the boulders, Shepard whipped out her pistol, and fired methodically until their heads weren't heads anymore, missing most of her shots, stopping for a few patient seconds when her weapon threatened to overheat.

* * *

"I'm okay, I think. I hit my head pretty hard, but the helmet did its job," Ashley assured, panting, as Alenko helped her up. Her attention was on the Commander. That girl was a freaking nutcase.

* * *

Shepard took baby steps along the rock wall and sat down carefully, her back resting against the stone. Every part of her body was aching. The sweat on her brow, the weakness in her limbs, the disgust and exhaustion rising within her were the telltale signs of a vasovagal response. She knew she would pass out if she didn't lie down. But the earth stank so damn much. She closed her eyes, listening to the air coming in and out of her mouth, letting the rock support her weight.

"Do you need help, Commander? I've got an energy drink here. And some medi-gel." The Lieutenant's voice. He sounded calm.

Shepard knew she was going to throw up one second before nausea gripped her stomach like a banshee, and violent contractions sent her into a painful retching phase. Holding on to a little outcropping, she ended up gagging against the cool stone, spitting out saliva from time to time. Blood came rushing to her face, tears welled up in her eyes. She cried a few genuine ones, lost among the others, until the spasms receded and she had to bite back the fire demon constricting her throat. It went straight to her heart.

"You may have internal injuries, Commander. Besides, we don't know what this thing did to you when it blew up. I don't think it's safe for you to go on in that state."

Shepard propped herself up as best she could and opened the little survival kit they were made to carry around, rummaging through the pouch until she found her cigarette pack. "It'll pass. Go check the sheds," she answered, slipping a cigarette out and sliding it between her lips. "That's an order, Lieutenant," she added without looking at him when he didn't move. Hands still trembling, she spun the wheel of her Zippo to ignite a small flame. He obeyed. The first whiff was like a bedtime story, a kiss on the brow. Shepard let it trick her brain with toxic comfort. Through her downcast lashes, she saw Williams staring at her and offered her a half-smile. "Want one, Chief?" she asked, tucking a strand of hair away.

"I don't smoke. And if I did, I wouldn't while I'm on duty."

Shepard nodded. She could sense the defiance in the woman's tone. A hint of scorn, a touch of interest. Williams settled down next to her and took off her helmet. She had glossy, ebony hair, a healthy tan and sharp eyebrows shadowing dark, indolent eyes. The picture of life. Shepard's attention went to the shadow of her own hand on the ground. A hand holding a cigarette languidly, bringing it to full lips. Like it wasn't hers.

* * *

Nihlus was in the process of radioing Shepard to inquire about her position and the gunshots resonating from the research camp, when the footsteps of someone coming up from the monorail had echoed, prompting him to take cover. Crouching silently behind the crate, pistol in hand, he waited. Geth on Eden Prime. And they were after Prothean technology. Although the finding of so well-preserved an artifact was a wonder in itself, it didn't make sense for the geth to break centuries of silent exile only to retrieve a piece of paleotechnology, unless they knew something the rest of the galaxy wasn't aware of. Something big. And they had evolved so much. Just how intelligent had they become? Who or what had they been in contact with beyond the Veil?

Footsteps got louder, closer. Was he about to gun down a machine, or a person? Both? He was glad to be a Spectre, it was his clearance for doubting, for changing his mind. Spectres were the Council's trump card, the one seed of chaos they preserved so that something could take over when order traditional order failed, when there was no acceptable solution; the very existence of Special Tactics and Recon was the galactic community's admission of its own inability to deal with the forces it couldn't control. But it was also the sign of a hidden fluidity, a willingness to adapt to the unknown. Nihlus wanted to believe that nothing was set in stone. Even synthetic life, for better or for worse.

He closed his eyes, focusing on what he could hear. Whoever was coming his way didn't sound like the geth he'd encountered so far.

_Three, _

_two, _

_one._

Nihlus bolted out from behind the crate, took aim and steeled his extended arm. But all this focused energy died down instantly when he found himself face to face with his mentor.

"Saren?"

"Nihlus."

_How many new implants this time, Saren? I can't even remember what you used to sound like when you still had a voice of your own_.

"This isn't your mission, what are you doing here?"

Saren turned around and took a few steps along the railing. Nihlus had always admired the way he moved, so predatory, so silent. He had loved his harsh demands, his dedication to bringing out the best in his apprentice, his desire to see him surpass his own teachings, and his affection also. No reproach, only improvement. After Nihlus' induction, they had drifted apart without a ripple in the water.

"The Council thought you could use some help on this one."

Something was off. "Unless you were already in this system twenty minutes ago when they got my status report on the attack, that's impossible. What's really going on, Saren? Why are you here?"

"Same as you. To secure the beacon," Saren replied, his voice deep, circling around Nihlus.

It was so elusive. A feeling of foreboding he couldn't quite place. But nor could he afford to doubt Saren, of all people.

"I wasn't expecting to find the geth here. The situation's bad," he said, taking in his surroundings, his mind far from what he was seeing.

"Don't worry."

Nihlus didn't exactly hear the pistol's safety clicking off, he didn't exactly feel the barrel against his skull. But something...

_Shit!_

He was knocked out of himself. He thought of his mother.


	3. Eden Prime 2

**The Beautiful Indifferent**

**Chapter 01 (Eden Prime, 2/2)**

* * *

_My waters broke as I was reaching for this journal. I am going to die in this shuttle, and so is my baby. I could have stayed. There is always regret, but I have heard the silence of the Citadel before it bustled with our hopes, and aspired to find it again elsewhere. I no longer need the secrets and prayers that have so far paved my way. It was bitter, and rich. My child, my daughter, had I remained, who would you have been? Who would I have been?_

**_From the _****Journals_ of Matriarch Dilinaga (_ca._ 512 BCE)_**

* * *

Shepard had been standing still by the Spectre's body for a long, tense minute. Blood was blossoming like a flower from the back of his head. _I took the liberty to put your name forward_. Her name would be weightless without his to back it up. Fitting, that this made-up name should finally reflect the irrelevance of its wearer. With Kryik dead and the beacon gone, there was no more trail for her to follow, or perhaps she just couldn't see it. She was no detective, and certainly no match for someone who could lodge a bullet in a Spectre's skull before he could even turn around. But then, she hadn't stood much of a chance on Earth either, or on Torfan. She looked up with a pensive frown, breathing in the fragrant evening wind, her heart heavy with unfulfilled expectations she couldn't grasp.

"We should get in touch with the Normandy," Alenko suggested, "give Captain Anderson a—"

"There's something over behind those crates!" Williams shouted.

Shepard squinted as the other two fell into stance, weapons in hand. She willed for whatever was hidden to be Kryik's attacker. To get it over with.

"Don't shoot! I'm human, don't shoot."

Neither the Lieutenant nor the Chief lowered their weapon, but Shepard could feel them relax at the sight of the man emerging from behind the crates. A dockworker. He put his hands up, his eyes jumping like mad butterflies from Williams to Shepard, to Alenko, back to Shepard.

"My name's Powell, I work at the—"

"What happened here?" Shepard interrupted, her gaze straying down to Kryik's body, and drifting off towards the hills. It was all so very silent. The dusky glow bathing the platform stirred a memory within her, of a cat she used to walk by everyday in the late afternoon when she was little. He was always sleeping on this windowsill, his cream-colored fur mingled with specks of the chalky, golden dust littering the streets. He was a soft, mellow cat, closing his eyes and purring in delight as soon as someone got into petting range. He smelled of warmth.

"Everything went to shit, is what happened. I've been hiding here since the beginning of the attack, I have no idea what these things are," the man said, pointing at the smoking carcass of a synthetic.

"It's okay, just start from the beginning," Alenko offered with a nod of encouragement.

"Okay," the dockworker said breathlessly, running a shaking hand over his face, his eyes embracing the carnage around him. "I was working right here, and suddenly there was a horrible, horrible noise, and we saw this monster of a ship coming down on us out of the blue, it was… I think it landed way past the other platform, but it was so huge we could see it all from here. We all gathered to watch, but the boss told us to get back to work. So we did, but everyone else, the soldiers," he said glancing at Ashley, "the supervisors, they were all going haywire when we lost contact with the rest of the team, on the next platform. And then I think the train was sent back to us from there, but it must have been loaded with… whatever they were, aliens, robots, I don't know. Everybody panicked when they started firing. Most people ran up there, towards the sheds, but I just hid here. I don't know how long it lasted."

"Why didn't you run too?" Williams objected, standing pretty much at ease now, her assault rifle loosely cradled in her arms.

"Why, well, I don't know. I was too scared, I just stayed here."

"What happened to that turian?" Shepard asked, kneeling by Kryik's corpse. The back of his head was a disgusting mess, but his face was intact, his eyes still shining. Beautiful green eyes. She didn't know how to close them.

"When the firing and all the racket stopped, I waited a bit, and right when I thought it was clear and I could get the hell away from here, a whole party of armored guys came back from the research camp and went down to the monorail. A turian stayed behind."

"This turian?" Alenko asked, pointing at Kryik's corpse with his pistol.

"No, another one. He had wires, prosthetics and whatnot coming out of his body. And he waited right here by the crates, and then this one showed up. I hid as best I could, so I can't tell you who is who, but one of them was called Cerin, Seren, or something like that. And they knew each other. They talked about how one of them wasn't supposed to be here because it was the other one's mission, and that the situation was bad, and then there was a gunshot, probably the grey one shooting him in the head," the dockworker explained, gesturing towards Kryik's body. "I think I'm gonna be sick," he added, his breath short.

Shepard raised her eyes, meeting the dockworker's. He couldn't hold her gaze for more than a second. She wasn't certain the man was lying. What were the signs? When the person blinked the wrong way? Avoided eye contact, sought it too frankly?

"Commander?" the Lieutenant whispered urgently, kneeling by her side. Shepard nodded, still looking at Powell. "I think I know who he's talking about. I was curious when Nihlus came aboard the Normandy, so I looked him up. He was trained by another turian Spectre, Saren Arterius. Pretty famous, apparently, even teamed up with Captain Anderson once. If this man here is telling the truth, it might explain why Nihlus lowered his guard long enough to be shot in the back so cleanly."

Shepard got up, taking a few steps towards the dockworker. "Do you know anything about some kind of artifact unearthed by one of the digging teams around here?"

"You mean the Prothean beacon?"

"Yes, the Prothean beacon," she repeated. There was a knot in her stomach and her palms were getting sweaty.

"Well of course I know something, it caused such a fuss. It was a goddamn anthill around here just this morning. The military, the scientists… Besides, I should know, because we were asked to move the beacon today. Me and my team were the ones who hauled it up on the cargo train to send it over to the other platform. Is that why you're here? For the beacon?"

"And that's the last you heard of it?" Shepard asked, leaning slightly over the crate separating them.

"Yeah." He looked worried. She knew he was fighting the urge to take a step back to reclaim his personal space.

"Okay. Tell me why you didn't run up to the camp like the others," she continued, her voice low enough that only he could hear.

"I told you," he replied, his voice an angry whisper. Funny how people picked up on the way you addressed them, and emulated it. There was no reason to whisper.

"You lied." It was only when the surprise in his eyes briefly gave way to something more inquisitive, perhaps in an attempt to determine whether she was bluffing, that she knew she was right. "You're wasting time I don't have. Tell me the truth now, or I'll shoot you. One knee, then the other, and so on."

"What the…," he breathed out, swallowing hard. "Aren't you… aren't you Alliance military?"

She nodded and held his gaze for a few seconds, then grabbed his head and slammed it against the crate. He screamed.

"What are you— " Williams exclaimed.

"Shut up!"

"But he's a civilian!"

Shepard flipped around and shot her a searing look, still pressing on the dockworker's head. "Keep. Your mouth. Shut," she said slowly before turning back to Powell. "So?"

"Oh my God, you're fucking crazy!" he yelled, his voice breaking into a mix of rage and fear. "I'm a smuggler, okay? I'm a goddamn smuggler! I stayed here to snatch a couple of grenades because everyone was running around without giving a shit! You happy now?"

Shepard let go of him.

"You did what? You smuggled military gear out of our supplies? You son of a bitch," Williams vociferated, closing the distance separating her from Powell, only to ram his head back against the crate. Shepard stepped back. "Do you have any idea what we've been through to try and protect your sorry ass? Do you have any idea what it feels like to watch your team get slaughtered and skewered on spikes?"

"Well obviously you screwed up somewhere because grenades or not, everyone's dead. Now get off me!" And with that, the dockworker wiggled his way out of Williams' grasp.

"You disgust me," she said, shaking her head. She took a deep breath and turned to Shepard. "Sorry, Commander, that was out of line."

"So you know what's out of line and what isn't?" Shepard replied, walking around the crates to pick up the two grenades.

* * *

oOo

* * *

Liara ran her hand over the smooth tiles of the alveolus. She wondered if a Prothean had ever done the same thing, over the very same tile. Unlikely. The mosaic was too perfect to have been assembled by hand, and the tens of thousands of identical tiles must have been mass-produced. Were these ruins ever used? She had several hypotheses on the matter. Each cell of those hive-like underground constructions seemed designed for containment, but containment of what? Specimens, prisoners? Were they storage rooms for precious or hazardous materials? The Protheans had left few traces behind, most of them architectural, traces so bare that they offered little more than speculation to the most thorough of archaeologists. That, combined with an almost timorous reverence for a species perceived as advanced beyond comprehension, was perhaps the reason so few researchers specialized in Prothean studies to begin with. And those who did zealously guarded their area of expertise. Liara couldn't blame them for dismissing her theories as unscientific, but they were going around in circles: so far, the University of Serrice had only agreed to sponsor her expeditions on well-known, over-exploited sites that had been stripped bare of any potentially significant find by generations of explorers; the richer, less accessible sites, like the newly discovered Mars archives, were either reserved to academic veterans accompanied by a few carefully selected students – and the competition was fierce to be among them –, or were protected by an impregnable fortress of red tape by whatever government or company owned the site.

The empty Therum ruins she was currently investigating were no exception. In fact, they contained so little of interest that the last expedition there dated back to 2152. The lifts and catwalks various excavation teams had put in place were falling apart. But getting her expedition sponsored was a small victory: for once, she had time, good equipment, and more importantly, she could work alone without anyone looking over her shoulder, without having to fight for every square centimetre of dirt, without a thesis supervisor in whose good graces she needed to remain. She could leave her notes out in the open, experimental protocols, sketches and poetic musings alike. Sometimes, Liara wondered if her ambiguous fascination for the Protheans, the reason why she had poured so much of herself into studying them, was that they were little more than a blank canvas for her to paint on. A mirror, even. There was something compelling about their ruins, a dry, beautiful harshness that called out to her. Their knowledge, their unreadable legacy, sometimes a hint of something different not only in degree, but in nature also – or perhaps it was a difference in degree so great, it amounted to one in nature? But that wasn't the sort of things you could demonstrate in an academic paper.

She remembered this essay by a hanar philosopher, _All that we are_ – one of those classics any student could quote without actually having read it –, in which he attempted to show how much of a construct the idea of the "Enkindlers" really was, and how his culture, like most others, had structured itself around the myth of its origin. And all this over nothing, or close to nothing: sunken ruins, stories, a few data caches offering blinding glimpses of technology.

* * *

oOo

* * *

"What _is _that?"

"It's huge," Ashley whispered, crouched behind the railing. She had never felt so high in her life, her mind sharpened to the point of pain. A voice in her mind was murmuring that this state wouldn't last, that it was just adrenaline, or PTSD kicking in, or the fact that all this was real. _It's so real_. She peeked at the platform below, littered with crates. The thing was standing right in the middle, perfectly still. It was taller, more heavily armored than the others, and alone, which probably meant it was packing some serious firepower. Rocket launcher kind of serious, if the size of its weapon was any indication. The gun's design was too alien for Ashley to identify its type, but it was oddly elegant— _Focus. Where's Shepard?_

She was about to turn around when she felt a hand on her shoulder. The Commander knelt down by her side as quietly as she could, and showed her one of the smuggled grenades she had picked up. She was still carrying her helmet around. Why wasn't she wearing it? Was the casing cracked, the radio broken? "What kind of damage does this do?" the woman whispered, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Ashley focused on the grenade to hide the skeptical frown creasing her brow. Concussion grenade. The fact that it was a prototype made it was a little harder than usual to recognize – no wonder that asshole had tried to smuggle them, those babies could easily go off for twenty thousand credits, even more on the black market –, but to a trained eye, it was obvious. And Shepard was supposed to be a trained eye. The woman was waiting, staring at her. Ashley could see her own reflection in those grey eyes.

"Decent damage, but small range. They're good in enclosed areas," she replied.

Shepard nodded, toying thoughtfully with that little bit of death. "Do you think you could throw it close enough to what's down there?"

Ashley glanced at the Lieutenant, who was observing their exchange, hoping for some sort of clue as to how to handle this. But he only wetted his lips before turning back to the interstice between the panes, through which they could safely - well, as safely as it got - look at the walking armory down on the platform.

"I don't know, Commander. It's a long way. Besides, the explosion will be really loud, it might alert more of them."

"Noise doesn't matter," Shepard declared. "They're networked: when one detects us, all of them do. What matters is getting the jump on this one before it can react. I'll throw the grenade if you won't, but your aim's better than mine. Your call."

Hearing the woman string a few sentences together for the first time, one of them an indirect compliment, at that, produced a curious effect on Ashley. It was the tone, she realized: quiet, detached, not the tone of a superior. She briefly wondered what kind of person Shepard was off-duty, how she spoke, or laughed, among friends. After their fight at the research camp, Ashley would have concluded that the woman was like a tourist parachuted in the middle of a war zone, just crazy enough to make it out alive by accidentally nuking everyone. Even her biotic powers, abilities, whatever they were called, seemed strong but out of control – Ashley's right shoulder blade could testify. But now, she wasn't so sure. The woman was obviously not a team player, but… maybe she knew what she was doing, in her strange, unpredictable way.

Ashley bit her lower lip. "Okay," she sighed, reluctantly taking the grenade from Shepard's hand. Alenko moved to the side to give her the room she needed. "You sure, ma'am?" she asked, mouth dry and heart thumping in her ears. Shepard, silently unclipping her shotgun, raised a questioning eyebrow at her, and Ashley realized that the last thing she needed in her record was a note from a known N7 operative flagging her the type who only followed orders when they suited her. Steadying her hand and focusing on the task at hand, she turned around and slowly got up until she had a clear view of the colossal synthetic below. Careful not to make any sudden move, she readied her arm and, in one swift arabesque, lobbed the grenade onto the platform. The aim was a bit off, but it might have been sufficient had the projectile not bounced over the railing, losing itself in the trench underneath the monorail.

Ashley's heart stopped as she waited for it to go off. It took a fraction of a second, but it was enough for her to follow the rails with her eyes, noticing how the metal shimmered in the distance. Everything was silent. One deep breath. The detonation echoed obscenely, further down the slope than she would have thought, propelling a geyser of earth in the air. This garden world was already being mauled by the colony's endless construction work, and there she was, ripping the land apart some more with a grenade prototype that cost more than her annual income. Absurd.

When her eyes fell on the synthetic, its flashlight head was already looking straight at her. _Oh Jesus_. It set its massive body in motion, raised its weapon – was it its arm? – and fired an ear-shattering round. Ashley ducked behind the panes, landing on top of the Lieutenant as the shot sculpted the metal into a convoluted, abstract shape, as if the alloy were clay. "Oh fuck, fuck, it's coming up!" She scrambled to get herself off Alenko, who said something she couldn't hear, and fell on her back with a thud, almost bumping into Shepard. The woman let out a barely audible sigh, resting her head against the railing like her subordinates weren't even here.

"What did you expect!" Ashley yelled. _Shut it, Williams! She's your superior, shut it shut it shut it! You wanna be doing paperwork in the ass-end of administrative hell for the rest of your career?_

Another round twisted the railing and the sheer force of the impact shoved Shepard onto the ground. She quickly pulled herself up before Ashley could help and, raising her head, nailed her with an unreadable, feverish look. "You're going to hold it up here, both of you. Understood?" she ordered with unexpected authority.

All of a sudden, Ashley wasn't high on anything anymore. "Aye aye, sir."

* * *

**_- And why do you want to serve?_**

_- To be part of something._

**_- I think you just want a way out of this dump._**

_- It's not a dump._

**_- Please. You're bullshitting your way through this interview because you're a street kid, and you realize that the world doesn't owe you anything. So it's up to you to do something, and here you are, because the army isn't known for being picky. Am I wrong?_**

_- Do you say this to all the dropouts who come into your office?_

**_- No, only to the smartasses, who by the way tend to make poor recruits, so if you want this to go somewhere, mind your tone and don't waste my time. Now, how bad is your situation?_**

_- Bad? I don't think it is._

**_- Why do you want to enlist?_**

_- I told you._

**_- You told me what you thought I wanted to hear based on our advertising campaign._**

_- No, I meant it._

**_- Fine, so what is it exactly you want to be a part of? …hello, are you listening?_**

_- Maybe it's less about "being a part of" than "taking part in" something._

**_- Okay, go on._**

_- In what's getting built out there, that we don't see here._

**_- What, the colonies?_**

_- No, not that, not just Alliance space. I mean, what's happening… to us, to our vision of the place we should occupy in a world that… doesn't need us, that was here long before us._

**_- …You mean the galactic community. That's what you're talking about, right?_**

_- Yeah._

**_- Okay, that's… let's see. I've got to hand it to you, it's an honest answer. Maybe a little too honest, actually. Right, so, I think I understand, but I don't see how joining the military would… satisfy those aspirations of yours. Sure, serving on a ship means that you'll get to see the world, but you'll remain Alliance first. And what army life will give you, ask from you, is pretty basic. There are career opportunities, of course, but it's a slow, thankless climb, and only if you're above average to begin with. I'm not telling you this to discourage you, but you need to be aware of that before you consider enlisting._**

_- I'm aware._

**_- Are you? We can provide you with a legal existence, which I believe you are lacking, we'll feed you, put a roof over your head, give you some basic education, train you, and demand that you risk your life on a regular basis. Nothing more, nothing less. For some, it's a lot, for others, it's not enough. What about you?_**

_- It's enough. More than I'll ever get here, you said it._

**_- What happened to "it's not a dump" and "my situation isn't bad"?_**

_- Why do you assume all I say is part of a strategy to get you to sign me up? This isn't a dump, it's a hot, noisy, overcrowded city, it's beautiful. And I'm all right. I'm not desperate. I just want more._

**_- Look, for what it's worth, I regret what I said about you bullshitting your way through this interview, I was wrong. That, or you're a very good liar. Regardless, I don't know you, but I see plenty of street kids in this office, looking for a way out. They're all desperate in some way. _**

_- It doesn't matter, then? What I say, or how peaceful my life was, even if I was alone?_

**_- That's not what I meant. The point is, my job is to filter applicants, to see through what they say, what they do, and decide whether they have the kind of potential we're after, whether they're worth the investment. Harsh, I know, but that's how it is. All this in a fifteen-minute interview. And you're a hard one to read._**

_- So we're done? You won't sign me up?_

**_- Do you smoke?_**

_- Sometimes._

**_- Here._**

_- I don't want a cigarette. I just want to know if you're going to sign me up._

**_- You look tired._**

_- I am tired. Will you sign me up?_

**_- Why are you tired?_**

_- I like taking midnight walks. Will you sign me up?_

**_- No._**

* * *

"How long do you need, Commander?" the Lieutenant asked, omni-tool and tech mine at the ready.

"Until I'm on the train."

"Wait. You're going down there," he said, and it was a question, but not quite. She focused on the catwalk again. The second the synthetic appeared around the corner… "To take the cargo train. And we're the distraction."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Williams turn around immediately. _I'm not sorry. _

A stretched out shadow loomed below. Shepard pulled hard on the railing to launch herself forward, her mind already tracing the mnemonic, anticipating the resulting flash of oceanic calm. It reminded her of those early afternoon hours back on Earth, when the sun made the air tremble over the sand, and everyone would nap the burning hours off, empty streets growing silent. Shepard wouldn't sleep then, it was a dream already, those slumbering streets. She realized just how big the synthetic was upon running closer to its shadow. Her hand triggered her nervous system and she squeezed herself between the colossus and the railing in a blaze of blue, feeling the pressure of invisible shields repelling each other, her biotic barrier absorbing most of the shock. She dashed off towards the train as the skirmish broke loose behind her. It took her a moment to figure out the commands, but she managed to activate the platform and sent it sliding effortlessly along the monorail.

She took off one of her gloves and ran her hand through her hair, head tilted backwards, letting the wind caress her brow like a cool palm. She leaned against the control panel, but when her hand came into contact with the metallic frame, electricity shot through her arm all the way up to her shoulder. She winced and brought her hand to her lips, nibbling on her forefinger to lessen the numb, unpleasant itch. One of the mess hall legends that circulated among young biotic trainees was that those unlucky enough to have been outfitted with L2 bio-amps would, at times, experience static discharges strong enough to send them into convulsions and possibly a cardiac arrest.

The next platform soon came into view, and Shepard hurriedly swallowed some concentrated sugar. She put on her glove, whipped out her rifle and focused on the rapidly growing, pristine structure. The cargo train came to a smooth halt. The place appeared deserted, neither corpse nor synthetic could be seen. Shepard quietly climbed the stairs leading to the bridge across the monorail, whose tracks stretched lazily up to a point where they simply ceased to exist, surrounded by petrified concrete mixers and excavators. They looked like lonely animals. On the other side of the bridge was a balustrade overlooking some sort of terrace.

Spotting two synthetics kneeling by a crate, Shepard lied down on her stomach and crawled to the edge of the parapet, setting her shotgun aside to replace it with her sniper rifle. Before she could zoom in on the synthetics, she noticed the apocalyptic landscape laid out beyond the terrace: a crater of molten rock and melted infrastructures, the earth burned beyond barrenness. That was where the sprawling dreadnought must have landed. Fumes rose in the air, darkening the sky.

Her heart skipped a beat when, shifting the focus of the telescopic sight to a closer range, she understood that the glowing, erected pillar she had first mistaken for a sign of some sort, was in fact the Prothean beacon. Enlaced waves of pulsating energy that looked like biotic fields, only green instead of blue, danced around its base, gathering into a single beam that shot through the sky. Was it broadcasting some sort of signal, one that the geth might have picked up on, hence their presence? Or were they the one who had activated the beacon in the first place?

Shepard adjusted her rifle's sight and the two synthetics came into view. They were still working on the crate. Shepard focused on it and froze. It wasn't a crate. It was a nuke. _Run_. _No point. Think._ She crawled away as fast as she could and, once she was out of sight, scurried back to the cargo train while activating her radio. It spat some static into her ear.

"Lieutenant, do you copy?"

Silence. Some more static.

"_Commander?"_

"Lieutenant, I'm sending the train back to you. Jump on it ASAP, the beacon is here, along with a nuke about to go off."

_"A nuke?"_ came the astounded reply.

"Move it!"

* * *

"Aye aye, Commander. Alenko out."

"Oh my god," Williams whispered.

"Come on, hurry," Kaidan urged, running down the catwalk. He jumped over the colossus' carcass, but a loud thud accompanied by a muffled cry prompted him to turn around and rush back to Williams who, in her haste, had tripped over the synthetic and banged her head against the railing. He helped her up. "You okay?"

"I think my brain just flew out of my skull. I'll pick it up later, let's go!"

"You'll be reunited soon enough if that bomb goes off."

"Oh, it can wait. My old instructor always said there was nothing in that head of mine anyway."

The beginning of a smile formed on Kaidan's lips. If they made it out alive, he'd certainly be putting in a good word for Williams. She was a skilled, dependable soldier. A survivor. Kaidan wasn't sure he'd have been able to pull himself together the way she did if he'd had to watch his entire unit get wiped out. And would he, like Shepard, have been able to send the men under his command to their deaths, as she had on Torfan, or right now, when she judged that his life as well as Williams' were an acceptable price to pay if it gained her a few minutes, a few seconds, in her pursuit of the beacon? And perhaps that handful of seconds would be the difference between mission accomplished and mission failed.

He launched the cargo train after making sure that Williams was on the platform as well, and activated his radio on a different frequency.

"Joker?"

_"Kaidan? Why are you using this frequency?"_

"I need to speak with the Captain in private, it's urgent."

_"I'll patch you through."_

Williams was watching him with narrowed eyes.

"_Lieutenant?"_ came the resolute voice of his superior.

"Sir, I don't have much time so I'll skip the formalities. There is a nuke, I'm on my way to deactivate it but in case it goes off, here's my report: Nihlus Kryik is dead, shot in the head by another turian named Saren, according to a dockworker who witnessed the exchange. It could be Saren Arterius, the Spectre. The colony was decimated by what appears to be a group of synthetics, and Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams, who was in charge of the beacon's protection, thinks they might be geth. The Commander has found the beacon and the nuke, she's waiting for us now. She doesn't know I'm reporting to you. Also, Jenkins was KIA, sir."

Silence. _"I see."_ Anderson finally replied. _"Joker, get us out of here, we don't know how big the nuke's radius might be. Thank you for your report, Lieutenant, I'll get in touch with Shepard. Anderson out."_

The line went dead. Kaidan exhaled a sigh where anxiety and relief mingled disturbingly.

"You did what you had to do, Lieutenant."

He nodded. They remained quiet until the next platform appeared in the distance. As they approached, they saw Shepard waiting for them on the overhanging bridge.

"This isn't how I imagined her," Williams said as the train began to slow down, her eyes fixed on the woman.

"Me neither. But it's not up to her to live up to a reputation based on something she did five years ago. We're the ones who have to adapt, as long as we're under her command."

"I know. I'm not saying she's incompetent, but the way she handles things… I don't know."

"That's how it is, Chief."

"Aye aye, sir."

"You did good, Williams. I'm glad I had you with me back there."

He saw her smile behind her visor as they got off the train. "Thanks, LT. I mean, sir."

"LT will do."

* * *

_"Commander? Anderson here, do you copy?"_

Startled, Shepard straightened up. "Yes, sir."

_"Alenko just gave me a sitrep. What can you tell me about the nuke? Did you see who set it up?"_

"Two synthetics were working on it."

_"Were you—"_

"Shepard out."

She switched off her radio and watched Alenko and Williams as they hurriedly climbed the stairs. Her eyes met the Lieutenant's. He had reported to Anderson without her permission, she knew it, and he knew she knew. He didn't lower his eyes. Of course not. What he didn't know what that she didn't mind. Harmless. She gestured towards the terrace, letting the two of them take the lead. It was out of her hands for now. She followed them, the heaviness of all that had happened settling her in her footsteps, in her aching muscles. By the time she reached the terrace, Alenko had dismantled a chunk of the nuke and was working on its bowels. Williams stood a few paces away from the beacon.

"It wasn't doing anything like this when they dug it up. Something must have activated it," she said, looking up.

Shepard watched Alenko work. He had taken his helmet off, sweat was running down his temples, whether from the stress or the effort, she couldn't tell. He was handsome. There was something proper and yet repressed about him. Her eyes wandered off to the Chief and widened incredulously when she saw her raise her hand to touch the beacon's glow. Shepard didn't exactly see it, but she _sensed_ it flash forward, wrapping itself around Williams' body for a split second. Shepard, entranced, watched her struggle against the invisible force pulling her towards the beacon, until she remembered that bringing the device back intact was her _sine qua non_ for something different. Something she had brushed against within Kryik's eyes, somber eyes that told her of other lives in this world, altered, connected.

She sprinted and shoved the Chief aside against impalpable resistance. They both hit the ground brutally, all air swished out of Shepard's lungs when Williams crashed on top of her. She pushed the woman away and scrambled to her feet, already beginning to trace the mnemonic that would trigger a stasis field to protect the beacon.

It lurched. Lifted up in the air, she wasn't granted a single second to be afraid before a dying world was burned into her memory. Thousands of lives screamed their joys and pains, every day, every sun, stories that couldn't find their way through her limited mental schemes, and the otherness that ravaged for reasons even their faraway minds couldn't grasp, empathy forced upon her, billions of agonies reaching out – something slammed her mind shut to protect her sanity.

* * *

oOo

* * *

"And the beacon?" Saren asked, his hand supporting his head, fingers over his downcast eyes.

"One of the humans may have used it."

Benezia stayed still when he suddenly pushed the armchair backwards, sending it flying across the room, and when, rising to his full height, he threw away all that was on his desk in a fit of inexpressible frustration. She stayed still when he turned around and stomped in her direction, grabbing her face between his palms with a snarl. She didn't blink, eye to eye. The more violent he became, the calmer she grew. He soothed her. Had she not been this false wise-woman, yearning to fuel her dying fire, athirst? Had she been content then, devoid of all tension?

He released her and walked away, pale in the gloom of the ship's interior. Even in immobility, he exuded power, a raw hunger that, wave after wave, eroded her. Her gaze was fixed upon him. Beyond him. Her mind left for an instant. Arms hanging loosely at her sides, she could still feel the soft weight of her baby's head on her shoulder. She turned her face slightly and looked out the window. The gentle sun of a fading afternoon bathed the room in pale gold, the air smelled of warm earth, the curtains were dancing in the slow, caressing wind. A shaky sigh escaped her lips. Something had come to an end. There was no joy in being a mother, no marveling at the giving of life, but there was calm. Cleansed of all worries, of all duties, a moment to inhabit and be inhabited by. Her baby in her arms.


	4. Normandy I

**The Beautiful Indifferent**

**Intermezzo I (Normandy)**

* * *

_She loved the rain. The colorless rain of a washed out day, or the golden rain of a hybrid hour, when stretches of deep blue sky rolled between saturated clouds, sunlight adorning every droplet. Shadowed hills and luminous plains. It was a painting, remembered, imagined. Once a month, admission to the museum was free for children, so she'd go and sit in the quietest room, drowsing in the air-conditioning until the paintings all around her coalesced into confused visions._

* * *

Karin ran a hand over Shepard's forehead out of habit, checking for a fever, disregarding the array of monitors tracking the young woman's body temperature. Karin had been rather surprised, upon undressing her, to find that she bore no scar. Only an impressive ecchymosis on her lower back, a few scratches, all of them recent. According to her medical record, the Commander had never sustained any serious injury. For one who grew up in the slums, took part in one of the bloodiest episodes of the Systems Alliance's battle history, and went through the N7 training program, it was quite a feat. It seemed that this lack of baggage, this ability to remain untouched Karin found so unsettling about her, marked her very skin. The air was coming a tad too quickly in and out of her slightly parted lips, there was movement behind the closed eyelids, and a barely noticeable sheen of sweat on her pale brow. What was she seeing?

Karin watched her breathe. It was just something she did, observing others as they slept, closed to the world. There was beauty to this state of absolute abandon.

* * *

"… remain stable, and let time do the rest. Oh, I think somebody's waking up. Welcome back, Commander."

Shepard blinked drowsily as an arm removed the harsh light piercing through her skull, and cool fingers touched her brow. It soothed her, and she closed her eyes again. She felt hot and sweaty, and sleepy. The fingers brushed a few strands of hair away.

"Can she hear us?"

"I think so, Captain. Give her a moment."

"Of course."

Every time she closed her eyes, the fingers would press her shoulder lightly, and after a while she understood she wasn't supposed to go back to sleep. Then memories came into focus, the fighting, Kryik's body, the beacon. Her eyes shot open and she inhaled sharply, saw Chakwas and Anderson in a blur before grasping the edge of whatever she was lying on to throw up above the floor. Chakwas hurriedly put an arm around her and pinned her hair out of the way. Nothing was coming out of her mouth, she was just heaving uncontrollably, her mind filled with a foreign pain.

"Doctor, what's happening?"

"I don't know, Captain," came the calm answer.

"Do you want me to wait outside?"

Shepard blocked out her surroundings for a few seconds, feeling the sharpness of those mental images recede into shreds. The wave of nausea had passed too. She let herself fall back onto the mattress. Anderson was gone. "I saw something," she panted before realizing how incongruous this must have sounded. Her eyes landed on Chakwas and fixed themselves upon her. The woman gave her a small smile.

"What was it?"

"I don't know," Shepard whispered, still staring at Chakwas. She needed something to anchor her eyes on, otherwise all would spin and spin. "I don't know."

Chakwas brought her a glass of water and helped her to sit up. Shepard gulped it down with a trembling hand, hating the taste it left in her mouth.

"I would say you just had a nightmare, since you were giving off all the clinical signs of intense dreaming. But given the circumstances, I will mention this in my report. We will go over it again in detail when you feel better. Do you hurt anywhere?"

Shepard let out a long sigh, feeling herself reintegrate her body completely. "What happened to it?"

Chakwas crossed her arms. "What's left of the beacon is on board. Whatever it did to you caused some kind of system overload. It exploded."

Shepard had no more words, and a single thought: _it's over, you're staying here_. She looked at her own hands.

"Is there anything you need? Something to eat, perhaps?"

She took a moment to collect herself. But then, there was no reason to appear fine, was there? There was no reason to even answer, it was all blown up to hell and gone anyway. But she did look at Chakwas, who held her gaze with such unwavering nonchalance. "Captain Anderson will want to speak with you at once. If you feel good enough, I'll tell him to come in. Take your time."

_You never know. Do something._ She readjusted the loose gown she was wearing. "I'm okay," she said, her voice raw, rubbing her forearms. Chakwas nodded, and there was kindness in her eyes. She felt absolutely disconnected from it. That beacon had burned agony into her memory and forced her to feel it.

"Doctor Chakwas tells me you're fine for the most part. I'm glad to hear it, Shepard," Anderson declared upon stepping into the infirmary at his usual brisk pace.

"Captain," she nodded, straightening up and stretching her back muscles discreetly in the process.

"Do you remember what happened yesterday?"

"Yesterday? How long was I out?"

"Fifteen hours, Commander," Chakwas replied.

"Can you remember anything?" Anderson insisted.

"I was so hungry, yesterday." The words felt like glue in her mouth. She tried to wipe the sweat off her brow, but her skin was dry. She tugged on her sleeve instead and saw Chakwas give her an odd look. "I'm hungry," she went on, realizing she was about to cry.

"Shepard, what are you talking about?" Anderson shot Chakwas a glance, but she wasn't looking at him.

"Do you have any idea how draining it is to use biotics when you're already hungry? Those Alliance implants are shit, I practically shocked myself to death when I touched a metal bar. Why hasn't a partnership with the Armali Council been established already, their amps are much safer," she snapped dryly. She shouldn't have. It felt good.

Anderson raised a hand to prevent her from speaking again. "Pull yourself together, Commander. Or take some rest if you need it."

She could see it in his eyes, he was trying hard to figure out whether she was losing it. "I remember everything. I'm sure Lieutenant Alenko's report covers it all. As for the beacon, I recall being pulled towards it, then its energy lifted me up. It was glowing green, I blacked out, I don't know what it did to me. I had nightmares, very dark nightmares. I've never had any like this before, so I'd say the beacon had something to do with it. That's all," she lied.

"What kind of nightmares, Shepard?"

She looked at Chakwas, who was casually leaning against the next bed. She was a rather elegant woman.

"I don't know. It hurt, some kind of recurring pain. I felt I was being killed over and over again. Nothing visual, just sensations."

Anderson nodded thoughtfully, his hands behind his back. He began pacing the room slowly. She rubbed the back of her neck. _A cigarette would be nice_. "Where are my things?" she asked Chakwas in a whisper.

"In your locker," the doctor answered in just as low a voice, an amused twinkle in her eyes. Shepard wasn't smiling though. She sighed. Of course, smoking was forbidden everywhere on the ship. She had no interest in breaking that kind of rules.

"Doctor Chakwas, I would like to speak to the Commander privately. Unless you want to keep an eye on your patient," Anderson said.

"She's all yours, Captain. I'll probably be in the mess hall, in case you need me for anything."

Shepard watched her stroll leisurely out of the infirmary. A tranquil person, that doctor. Shepard herself had achieved this sort of indolent way to occupy space, she was very aware of her own physical presence. She had her inner storms, but they rarely showed, although she didn't try to hide them. She couldn't stick to a particular course of action, a steady, reliable way to handle things. She wandered within, or drowned into her surroundings, and even thiswasn't a personal philosophy. It was only what required the least effort on her part. Over time, years of intimate evolution, she had gradually begun to reject any form of effort that wasn't strictly tied to the necessities of the life she had chosen for herself. She would drift as painlessly as she could, occupied by thoughts or aimless musings, letting even stoicism or calm slip through her fingers. Stillborn momentum occasionally struck by sudden aspirations, all the more violent.

"We're on our way to the Citadel, I've already requested a meeting with the Ambassador. Hopefully he will he able to get us an audience with the Council itself. The situation's bad, Shepard."

"Kryik is dead and the beacon is destroyed," she said, looking at her fingers moving idly.

"More than that. First, we lost Jenkins," He glanced at her but she gave him nothing. "Oh, I know better than to expect a eulogy from you, Shepard. But from a practical point of view, knowing most of our crew aren't exactly seasoned sea wolves, it's having a great impact on them. They're not ready. I'm beginning to think the Normandy requires a different kind of crew. One that can adapt to what we have to face now. Every human colony is in danger, Shepard." He paused and looked at her again. She had no idea what he was talking about. "This dockworker you interrogated back on the platform said that he had witnessed a turian named Saren, whom Nihlus Kryik seemed to know, shoot him in the head. It was obviously a Spectre as well, because according to Alenko's report, the dockworker mentioned a brief conversation between the two prior to Kryik's murder, during which Nihlus told this 'Saren' that he shouldn't be here because it wasn't his mission. It can only be Saren Arterius, one of the top elite operatives serving the Council's interests. He has gone rogue, which doesn't surprise me that much. I know him, we've worked together, and let me tell you it was not pretty. He gets the job done, at any cost, going for the quickest and easiest way, which often involves a lot of civilian casualties. As a Spectre, his word is favored over all others and so far he has always succeeded in either justifying those casualties or, when he couldn't, in pinning it on somebody else. And he has a notable dislike for humans."

Shepard watched him pace the room. Unbelievable. Their eyes met, and he must have read something unpleasant in hers because he stopped and waved impatiently. "I'm not sure you're aware of the gravity of the situation, Shepard. We have a Spectre, gone rogue, at the head of a considerable army of synthetics that are very likely geth. He has control over a dreadnought the design of which has never been seen on this side of the Perseus Veil. Somehow he heard about the beacon, which was one of the most classified discoveries of this century, and he wanted it. Something tells me that it was not for its sheer potential, but that he already knew something about it. And whatever he needed from it, he received, and had you not stopped the nuke from detonating, we would have lost what little we could salvage of it. None of our colonies, even Earth isn't safe. We're not armed for this. Do you understand?" he ended up asking after staring at her for a few seconds, expecting a reaction.

"Yes, sir."

"Stop it, Shepard." She raised her head and met his gaze. "I had you transferred on the Normandy because I believe you are one of those unconventional types that can make a great difference in seemingly hopeless situations. And you proved yourself once more on Eden Prime. I can see you have no profound respect for the chain of command, but I am ready to deal with this because I want to believe something in you is here to serve humanity, in your own way. I supported your candidacy to be part of Special Tactics and Reconnaissance for one reason: for someone like you to truly advance humanity's cause in the chorus of races we have to find a place amongst, to make our voice heard, more freedom is needed, more opportunities like Torfan or Eden Prime. But sometimes I feel you don't care, and at other times, that you're playing a game according to some personal rules you're not willing to share. You're entitled to your private beliefs and convictions of course, but it doesn't change the fact you're under my command and you've sworn to serve the Alliance, and there is too much at stake here, too little time for me to try and read you. So if you have something to say, I would have you tell me instead of giving me a half-assed _Yes, sir_. That, or hide your skepticism better. Now, speak your mind. Don't make me order you."

Shepard let out a sigh. "All right," she replied, resting her back on the wall behind her. "All this, the rogue Spectre, the geth, the danger for humanity's colonies. A theory based on what? A self-appointed eyewitness claiming to have seen what happened to Kryik, Kryik's body itself, and aggressive synthetics as well as some footage of an unusual dreadnought. And you're telling me," and at that moment she felt a wave of disgust swarm over her, and decided that she had gotten all she could from this place, "you're giving me this far-fetched scenario about a Spectre named Saren Arterius, whom you have a personal grudge against, and how this dockworker's testimony is enough ground for you to believe he has gone rogue, and is now leading an army we know nothing about but you think _might _be geth. And while we're at it, let's not forget that this turian doesn't like humans, so it's obvious he wants to wipe us all out, 'even Earth isn't safe', right? Let's send in the cavalry, let's inform the Council and demand action, and if they voice any doubts or concerns, we will have every right to feel stalled. After all, they're happy to have us explore and colonize new systems, but if we're met with unexpected resistance, we're on our own. Is that it, Captain?"

"And what do _you _think, Shepard?" Anderson asked, his voice low, controlled.

"Me? I want no part in making humanity's voice heard, as you put it. I fail to see what we brought to other races so far, aside from fresh enthusiasm and military tactics. I don't think this is the way." She exhaled the air she'd been holding back. "There is only one collective cause I would consider profitable, that of a galactic community. Each race has its distinctive features, I'll give you that, but do you think they justify a battle of private interests, or desperate attempts at getting a seat on the Council to do what, exactly? Bring what knowledge, what betterment? I'm aware politics are politics and other races are perfectly capable of stabbing each other in the back without your help, but it's not the way. Humanity should learn instead of impose, offer instead of trying to make itself indispensable. And there is so much-," her voice refused to come out. She swallowed, fueled by her suffocating desire to breathe in new air, assimilate, move on.

Silence stretched, then Anderson spoke. "I will tolerate this attitude for now, Shepard, because it might very well be the first time I hear some personal involvement in your words. But I can't ignore the fact there is something about you that is in complete contradiction with what the Alliance as a whole is trying to accomplish within this new world we're facing. Perhaps you will fare better as a Spectre, should you ever become one, although how you can conciliate this faith in some supra-racial galactic community with what you're capable of doing, is beyond me."

_What?_ "I don't think I can convey what is needed for you to comprehend my position. This personal involvement you think you hear in this desultory rant is due to the fact that I'm tied to humanity, to its army. I don't regret it, it was the only way I could think of to see the world out there. And there is a world, beyond humanity and its interests. I can't even say the Alliance was a means to an end for me, I don't have a plan, an agenda. When the opportunity to become a Spectre arose, I just went for it. It was only a few hours ago but the idea of it made such a difference. The way humanity handles itself is a matter of some concern only as long as it impacts me directly. Nothing more. As to what I'm 'capable of doing', I don't know. I just do it. It's enough work taking care of yourself on the battlefield, I can't deal with others, I have no interest in it. If they die, they die, if they take a bullet instead of me, I live and they die. And you can't possibly be referring to the way I wiped the batarians during the Torfan assault. You're much worse than I am because you decorated me for it, all of you. I got rid of whatever was in my way until the place was secured, and those who tried to surrender then, I don't know. I don't care. Anything else? I'm very hungry."

Anderson was looking at her, disbelieving and preoccupied (she _knew_, she just knew), feelings waging a barely noticeable war on his face. He sighed and dismissed some personal thoughts with a hand wave. "I'll send Doctor Chakwas back here. I suggest you recover your strength before we reach the Citadel, in a couple of hours. Be in uniform, and bring a single weapon with you, only Citadel Security is entitled to more. And, Shepard. I've lived a life of duty and responsibility, I believe that if there were more people like out around, it would be a disaster. But as long as you're a rare breed, perhaps you'll accomplish something. And we will have to go over the beacon incident again before we meet with the Ambassador. I want your report on the Eden Prime mission sent to me ASAP." He gave her a nod and strode out without waiting for any form of acknowledgment.

Shepard tilted her head backwards, eyes closed. She had never consciously desired to confide in someone, to let the world see who she was. Perhaps because she didn't feel like she was putting up an act, she didn't hide much, and what little she kept to herself was more of a reverie than confession-material. And yet, to let someone know that they had better keep their expectations low when it came to her, was soothing. Anxiety was seeping through her every thought. It was horrible.

* * *

oOo

* * *

Kneeling over the bowl, Liara splashed her face with clear water. The heat was hard to bear sometimes, not so much in the tiled cells, but in the caves. She was beginning to suspect, although she was no geologist, that perhaps the Prothean structure had been there first, and that these lava rock caves had formed all around it over thousands of years. Of course, the idea that there might be a significant number of Prothean ruins buried deep underground, trapped in rock and sediments, was nothing groundbreaking. However, she did find it quite odd that most of these ruins seemed to have been built according to plans indicating that the architects knew about – and chose to work with – the mineralogical growth that would engulf their constructions. As if the Protheans had a symbiotic relationship to their environment, and yet built structures of considerable size that must have had a heavy impact on it. Although undeniably advanced, she was convinced that the Protheans had motives of their own, and did not necessarily share the values most would have them embody.

She got up and stretched slowly, letting the water dry on her naked forearms. Upon settling in a new archeological site by herself, she would usually remain properly clothed for a few days before beginning to wander around in a lighter attire. Solitude and hot, dusty atmosphere made one indifferent to their looks after a while. Rolling up the sleeves of a loose tunic made more sense than digging around with a lab coat on. Liara often wondered if, given a few years of complete isolation on some remote dig, she would end up naked, unwashed and unable to see the point of appearing decent to her fossilized empire. She would become a beast, losing a little of her sense of self in the process. Everyone was a beast when no one was watching, were they not?

She sighed, looking around. It was a very dead place. She brought life to whichever dig site she decided to anchor at, not the other way round. She was usually able to fill herself with the ghosts of previous occupants, but on some rare occurrences, she felt the emptiness of it all. They were long gone. The passion was always stronger, the insatiable hunger and conviction that there was something to be learned, that was why she never felt utterly discouraged. But weary at times, as if she herself were disappearing under crumbling monuments, with no desire to sink, but no desire to make her way to the surface either.

Standing still, she was lost in thought when she heard the elevator go up, the one by the cells across the cave. She flipped around, heart pounding as if it sought to burst out of her chest, and she watched it ascend. Once the first moment of panicked incredulity had passed, she quickly assessed the probability that whatever was coming down was hostile. And it was high. This dig site was located in a backwater part of the planet, far from any colony, its mining facilities abandoned. The underground ruins themselves were hard to find, not to mention the fact that their access was heavily restricted. One had to possess official clearance to open the sealed entrance to the site. And Liara knew that if a permit had been delivered to somebody else recently, she would have been informed. Scavengers? But those ruins had been discovered and charted for a long time, they were empty, there was nothing classified about them.

She shook herself from her stupor when the elevator disappeared from her field of vision. She needed to hide, but her small camp was nestled in a dead-end, and to reach another level, she needed the elevator. Her eyes fell on the nearest alveolus and she bit her lower lip. She _knew_ these cells had been built for containment. Of what, why, she had no idea, but she was pretty certain that the control panel present in each of them could trigger some kind of protection field, if activated correctly. Which was the problem. She had only observed them so far, collecting data, knowing better than to toy with unknown technology. She also knew that the gigantic well formed in the middle of what she had begun calling the Hive – it was designed like a tube the surface of which was constituted by rows and rows of tiled cells – possessed some kind of Prothean elevator, very different from the creaky lift used to access the different levels of precarious scaffolding that had been set up after the discovery of the ruins. But she had no idea how to activate the platform so that it would come up to her floor.

_Why is this happening to me,_ her mind murmured as she proceeded to stuff as many of her OSDs, sketches and notes as she could into a worn-out satchel she carried around everywhere. She dashed past the mining laser, climbed upon the walkway and ran to the alveolus, stopping in front of the control panel. It was as functional as she had left it, and just as undecipherable. _Some scholar I am_, she thought, her eyes scouring the glowing commands. To the archeological world's current knowledge, the Protheans had no alphabet, and the occasional signs displayed by this or that construct were not part of a pictographic system. She couldn't press something at random, the risk was too high of triggering a cataclysmic event. She glanced outside the cell and took a few steps towards its outer limit, raising her head to try and see if the elevator was coming down. The ruins were silent. The possibility of a mechanical failure causing the contraption to go up randomly was beginning to caress Liara's mind when finally, the elevator began its descent in a concert of rusty cables.

_Oh goddess_. Liara stood there, frozen, the noise growing louder, rattling, unbearable after days of silent excavating. The part of her mind that was still racing told her to wait until she saw what was in that elevator before trying her luck with the cell's controls. They might even not be operational, for all she knew. The noise stopped, just above the alveolus, and she heard a grunt as well as some electronic buzzing and the sound of too many feet. And just like that, a krogan landed right in front of her, barely two metres away. They stared at each other for a while, but then Liara's attention was diverted from him (come to think of it, she wondered if a few krogan males weren't actually females trying to either escape a difficult position as potential fertile genitors, or-). By what, she couldn't tell. They didn't look like any race she was familiar with, or in any case, their bodies were entirely covered by armors the queer design of which she had never encountered.

"Get her, boys, I think we found our doctor," said the krogan with a horrible smile and a low, surprisingly soft voice. The armored things surrounding him marched into the cell.

Liara allowed herself to stop thinking. She let the dark energy course through her nervous system, along her arms, and pushed them out of the alveolus effortlessly even as she ran back to the console. She glanced at the krogan, who had been rammed against the railing along with his minions, and slammed her palm against the Prothean control panel, expecting to be fried on the spot.

Nothing happened. _Oh dear_.

* * *

"_Is it better now, can you hear me?"_

"_It's perfect. How are you?"_

"_Filthy. You would not want to hug me right now."_

"_I changed your diapers for years, Liara."_

"_True. That is not an area I was particularly precocious in, was it?"_

"_I wouldn't say that. One day, you simply announced me that you were done with diapers. And that was it. You were four."_

"_I wish I had possessed this sort of resolve beyond diapers. Children have this uncanny ability to know what they want sometimes."_

"_You can still be pretty stubborn."_

"_You know what I mean."_

"_We all struggle to make decisions, Liara. Knowing what path to tread is the exception, not the other way around."_

"_Is that what makes you so respected, knowing what to do?"_

"_Most respect me because they think I do. The truth is, I have simply accepted not to know. My knowledge, my culture and experience, all this weighs oddly little in the face of the simplest choice. We live day to day. It does not have to be worrisome. You will feel it, when you're ready."_

"_And how do you stop worrying about the future? How do you convince yourself that it is all right to live day to day?"_

"_You tried something else."_

"_What do you mean?"_

"_I mean that as we speak, you are sitting in a small tent, your hands 'filthy,' as you put it, from the hours of excavating you just did. It's your way to preserve yourself from whatever causes you distress when you think of the future. It's as valid a coping mechanism as any, but of course it's not just that."_

"_So I bury myself in the past to cope with the future? Thank you, Mother, but allow me to tell you that this had occurred to me before. And in case you did not know, roaming an archeological site and spending a day dusting old artifacts which, most of the time, end up being fossilized soda cans, does not relieve one of their anxiety regarding the next day."_

"_What are you afraid of?"_

"_The deadline for my thesis is approaching, and I cannot seem to focus at all. I am wondering if my interest in the Protheans justified the… I know you are about to tell me I can begin anew, that everyone can begin anew at any given time, that we create obligations for ourselves that need not bind us to begin with. And that I am only sixty-four, that I can afford to complete my thesis in ten years instead of three if I feel like it. I know all that. But it helps little."_

"_Which is why I did not tell you all this, Little Wing. Don't assume too much."_

"_I am sorry, I did not mean to imply you were not supportive. You have always preserved my freedom of choice while still being there for me, and I am grateful for that balance."_

"_Don't apologize, Liara, not with me. You are indeed only sixty-four, but don't let your age speak for yourself. You have great potential, but you must understand that you're allowed to be wrong and to fail, and my position as a matriarch must not be a weight on your shoulders. Errors often open up unexpected paths. I cannot tell you what you will accomplish, or if you will find your place in this world, but there are two things I do know: I love you, and you will never disappoint me, because you're trying to be true to a self you're barely beginning to outline."_

"_How can you speak with such certainty?"_

"_Nothing is certain, but some of us are granted moments of clarity throughout their life. I experienced one of those when you were born, it is that which gave me what I needed to accept the doubt inherent to living. I felt that there was not much to regret, because all my decisions had led me to you, in my arms. And that given the ability to change anything in my life, I wouldn't have wanted it any other way, at that moment."_

"…"

"_Liara?"_

"_Yes. I felt a similar sense of belonging a few times. But it never lasted."_

"_When was that? Unless it's something private."_

"_Do not worry, my secret garden is well kept. I think I felt happiest every time I could sense that there was a sea of possibilities before me, like opening a cherished author's new book. You do not know what it will be about, but you trust them. Sometimes I would even leave the book untouched, just to keep that feeling to be on the verge of something that could only be wonderful."_

"_Are you aware of what you're alluding to?"_

"_What would that be?"_

"_Love, Liara."_

* * *

oOo

* * *

When Williams stopped talking, her gaze wandering beyond his left shoulder and a frown creasing her brow, Kaidan turned around. He only blinked as he watched Shepard come out of the infirmary, wearing nothing but a gown and a pair of shorts with the Alliance logo printed on them. She looked like she had just woken up, and it was probably close to the truth. Kaidan had never seen an officer wander around any military ship like they would in their home. And there she was, barefoot, hair tousled, pale legs made even paler by the crude light. He felt his throat constrict. Some women managed to retain some sort of unconscious, languid femininity no matter what they were doing or wearing. But then, Kaidan couldn't exactly be sure that she wasn't aware of it.

"I'm glad you're okay, Commander," he said as she got closer to them. She nodded with a vaguely surprised look at Williams, and made her way to the food dispenser.

"Should I salute or something?" the Chief whispered.

"I don't think that will be necessary." He watched Shepard proceed to identify herself, transferring the weight of her body to her right leg as she waited for the dispenser to provide her with her ration. The compartmented tray popped from the depths of the machine, and she brought it to the table.

"I'm sorry, Commander. About the beacon, and what it did to you. I think it was triggered when I approached it."

Shepard, who was unwrapping her meal, raised her eyes to meet Williams', but said nothing. The silence was becoming uncomfortable, and Kaidan, who had been watching them alternatively, ended up taking a sit in front of Shepard.

"It's on board," he said. "As well as Jenkins' body. We thought we were going to lose you too, Chief Williams and I had to carry you back to the Normandy."

Shepard kept looking at them. Kaidan wondered if she had the slightest idea how to deal with them both. Were they making her uneasy?

"I see," she said at last, her attention back on her food tray.

Kaidan exchanged a glance with Williams, who was shaking her head slightly but sat down nonetheless. And they watched Shepard eat. To watch a biotic eat was to witness a fascinating process: some of them wolfed down their food, others were fast and methodical, and Shepard, well. She was indeed a fast eater, as well as a careful chewer, but above all, Kaidan could practically _see_ wave after wave of relief wash all over her. She was hunger itself, but the starved, desperate kind. Not stopping between bites, breathing the way one took a gulp of air before diving again, focused on her task with rapt attention as if it were tribal ritual of some sort. Kaidan shook himself out of his fantasy, the image of Shepard as a disheveled, roaring cavewoman crossing his mind. He knew it was unbelievably rude to be here, watching her eat in silence. That eating was something private, even though it was often done in public. He remembered those old science-fiction novels depicting societies where traditional eating habits had been banned, replaced by molecular nutrients, or some such meal substitutes, thus gradually making the very act of swallowing food a rather obscene spectacle.

As she got halfway though her meal, she raised her grey eyes again – or were they blue? –, looking at her subordinates as she chewed, swallowed and dug up spoonful after spoonful (Kaidan noticed she wasn't using her fork at all). She was looking at them and there was something daring, or was it mocking, or was there anything at all, in those eyes. He wondered if she was exaggerating, putting up a show in response to their staring. But her relationship to others seemed beyond defiance. As if she didn't have time for this, as if she were after something much more important, looming in its vague direction at a changeable pace. Sometimes driven, implacable, and at other times, straying inexplicably.

He had thought about her a lot, during those few hours since they had left Eden Prime. He thought of what he didn't understand, of what he perceived. He didn't like her, and as he watched her finish her meal by taking long, slow sips of water, he traced the curve of her slender arm, and how her fingers curled around the cup. A pianist's hands. And then she got up and, putting a palm on her stomach, let out a heavy, barely audible sigh. She got rid of the tray and left the mess hall without a word.

"Well. That was weird," Williams declared a moment later.

* * *

Chakwas peeked into the storage room, but Shepard was nowhere to be found in the infirmary. She got out and, spotting Lieutenant Alenko at the mess table along with the young marine for whom Captain Anderson had requested a transfer to the Normandy, walked towards them.

"Doctor Chakwas," Alenko said, getting up.

"Lieutenant. And… Chief Williams, am I right?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Did any of you happen to see Commander Shepard? I came down to check up on her after the Captain told me their discussion was over, but she's not in the infirmary."

"She came out about fifteen minutes ago to get something to eat. I think she went to the shower room after that."

"Well, if you see her, tell her to come see me, will you?"

"Of course."

Chakwas was already a few paces away, when she stopped and turned around. "How is…?" she asked, pointing at her own head.

"I'm okay. It flared up a bit after we got back here, but I'm fine now. Wouldn't say no to a good night's sleep, though."

"The ransom of your exploits on Eden Prime, Lieutenant," Chakwas replied with a smile. "Don't hesitate to come to the infirmary if you get any further symptoms."

"Will do, Doctor."

As she walked back into her lair, she heard the Chief say: "Symptoms? Thwack me on the head if I'm being nosy, but are you okay, LT?"

* * *

Shepard's eyes snapped open, and the sensation disappeared, although her memory instantly reproduced it. She'd just had a hallucination. There, leaning against the wall, hot water raining onto the back of her neck and trickling down her body, she had felt hands all over her skin, and a fistful of sand being thrown at her face. Despite the sensation tasting as real the rivulets running down her hair, her eyes, nose and lips, the thought that actual hands were touching her hadn't even crossed her mind. She knew she'd been hallucinating. Was she losing her sanity for good, or was it the beacon? _What did you do to me, did you change something?_

She let herself slump slowly until she was sitting on the floor, head low so that she could breathe through the water coming from above. She wasn't afraid. A part of her longed for her own impulses, faint traces of oddity, she was used to them, gave in easily, sometimes they were comforting. But a tactile hallucination was something else. She remembered this distant afternoon when, as a teenager, she had lifted the lid of a trash can and felt a vague urge to dump herself in there. She remembered imagining that if someone saw her doing it, they would think her deranged, when giving in could in fact be a relatively calm decision, not an uncontrollable impulse. And yet it was strange, stepping into a dumpster for no identifiable reason. As if most people believed that there was an impassable barrier between them, who would never think of doing such a thing, and this girl, who not only got this impossible idea, but acted on it. For her, in truth, the line between thinking it and doing it wasn't that clear, sometimes.

She sighed, putting a hand over her brow, willing her thoughts to stop roaming those sterile lands. Memories mingled with grand considerations on the human psyche, polished by the thousands of minds that had mused on them over centuries, each of them feeling like a discoverer because understanding something was akin to creating it anew. Maybe she should talk to Chakwas about it. The woman was all right, phlegmatic enough to appear as unfazed by a gunshot wound as she would by psychotic symptoms, but it all went into the file regardless. Was there such a thing as an off-the-record conversation? If nothing else, having been violated – had she been violated? – by the beacon had had one consequence: Shepard felt sharply aware of her restless thinking, her unconventional ways. She couldn't determine whether it was her usual attitude, or if the beacon had amplified something, or if perhaps she was unconsciously fulfilling her own prophecy because any explanation was easier to bear than the unknown. No one, to public knowledge, had ever been touched by Prothean technology that directly. Long-term side effects, the nature of whatever had been forced into her mind, or what gates it had opened within this mind, she would be the first to experience it.

Come to think of it, why weren't scientists buzzing all around her? Why was she sitting naked on a tiled floor in a tiny cubicle, soaking in recycled spaceship water, mulling over her hallucinations? The handful of sand being thrown into her face was hers alone, at least. They used to do this to her back on Earth. She had walked into crowded, labyrinthine alleys full of shops and signs, had raised her eyes and seen endless urban heights hiding the sky, and she had strayed to the highest levels of the megatropolis, losing herself in the hypnotic maze of shivering clotheslines and tiny whitewashed houses, untouched by the technological frenzy of the underbelly, life muffled by the heat of the sun, she had seen the kids splash water over each other, and all this water had mingled with the dust. Sky was so blue up there. Creating a mass effect field was plunging into the blue like a weightless skiff across the sea, and she had seen space too, and now it was raining down on her, she would dream it off._ I must be gone and live, or stay and die_, the only Shakespeare quote she ever learned, sampled from a traveler's journal. She did so like geography. Especially maps.

* * *

"You're not being nosy. I was implanted with an L2 bio-amp, but I get milder side effects than most, so I don't consider myself particularly unlucky."

"Sorry, I don't follow," Ashley said with an apologetic look.

A surprised blink was all he allowed himself to show. She was grateful for it. "You know how we function, right? As biotics, I mean. We have the necessary energy within us, but without an implant to harness and enhance it, we'd never be able to control our nervous system to trigger mass effect fields at will."

"Oh, I remember. L2 is the name of some obsolete implant model or something, right? Sorry, I just… It goes way back, we covered the subject of biotics in a couple of half-assed lessons, but us regular grunts don't get much info about, well, you. I'm not one of those biotic haters, and I know you're not reading my thoughts or anything, it's just… unfamiliar territory. So, tell me about those side effects before I embarrass myself any further. Unless that's considered a private question? Or a bad pick-up line? I'll just stop talking now."

Alenko let out a quiet laugh. "Relax, Chief. I get headaches on a regular basis, and nasty migraines after intensive use of my abilities. Other than that, just the usual bonuses that come with being a biotic: random static discharges when I touch metal, and a scary appetite. And a pretty blue glow. Have you ever seen an asari use their biotic powers?"

"LT, I'm a grunt. I've never even seen an asari."

"Neither have I, I meant in some vid or on the news. Anyway, since the asari are blue to begin with, seeing them glow with dark energy is a very interesting sight. And their culture has incorporated biotics for much longer than we have. Their bio-amps are the finest you can find, but even without them they could stand their ground: their power runs deeper, they control it better… We have a lot to learn from them in that respect."

"I guess, but the Alliance is a long way from entrusting their biotic trainees to aliens, and I can't say I blame them."

Alenko gave her a long look. "I was trained by a turian biotic, you know. Humans had no idea how to handle us, and felt they didn't have the time to conduct careful research, so they just hired aliens. It's over now, of course."

"Wait," Ashley replied, trying to conceal the mildly disgusted scowl she felt spreading on her face. "You mean the Systems Alliance asked _turians_ to supervise the training of newly discovered biotics? Right after the First Contact War?" Alenko seemed slightly taken aback by her virulence, and she slapped herself mentally. _Get a grip_.

"Yes, Chief, they did," he answered, soft voice and all. "And they covered it up. It's not classified, but certainly not part of the Academy's history course. It's not a very glorious chapter."

"What happened?" she asked with a frown.

"Ah, long story, Williams. Long story."

"All right, hint taken. My grandfather fought in the Shanxi battle, I guess it makes me a bit twichy to think turians handled our biotics right after this," she replied in an attempt to explain her defensiveness.

"I see. Well, you know what wars are like, there's good and bad on both side."

"You're probably right," she acquiesced, unconvinced.

He gave her a smile. "Nihlus was an okay turian, don't you think? From what the Captain said when we retrieved the body, I mean."

"I don't know what I think. About Spectres I mean, this whole aura of impunity surrounding their methods. But yeah, I guess he was decent. Though I'm still a bit bugged about an alien having full access to the Normandy. I know he's dead anyway, but still. Cutting-edge technology, etc."

"Williams, the Normandy was mostly designed by turians, it was them who showed us great trust by participating in this project, and letting the Alliance own the ship. Even the turian fleet doesn't have one like this, though it won't be long before they do. There might be a lot of things we can complain about in the way we're being treated by the Council, but the matter of the Normandy was proof that they're willing to collaborate, to advance our interests as well as theirs. That's something."

"Let's say you're the voice of reason, and I'm just following my bitter gut feelings. Bu I still don't think the Normandy co-op was done out of pure philanthropy on their part."

"I didn't say that. It's always a form of trade, but the designing of the Normandy was, I think, a good kind of trade. You can't deny they have a lot to teach us."

"So do we."

"I hear you, and you're right. But we're a very young race compared to most of them."

"We're bringing them fresh blood."

Alenko smiled again. This gentle smile. He was a clever man, but not the kind to give her that look she was used to receiving from those who, seeing her as the local rifle cleaner who could occasionally hit the bull's-eye, automatically assumed she was a tough, uncultivated butch.

"We are," he said. "But they're space-faring civilizations to the core, and we're not halfway there. It'll take time, but I think that if we manage to make it go both ways, a lot of good could come from association instead of confrontation. We can't afford isolationism."

"I don't vote for Terra Firma, Alenko. Lieutenant, I mean. I just think we should be careful."

"Our Ambassador on the Citadel makes sure of this, from what I hear. He'll be waiting for us when we arrive."

"Terrific. I'm aware I sound very grumpy about everything, but, politicians? I don't know. I don't resent most of them for being assholes- sorry," she bit her tongue. She was just so rude, indelicate! _Shame on thee, Williams, who used to know Heinlein by heart!_

"I don't mind. Go on."

"Thanks," she smirked. "Well, I can see how, when given such power, one might yield to the temptation of using it for themselves. But it's kind of discouraging. Will we ever get someone who truly has humanity's interests at heart? For more than the duration of their campaign?"

"Only time will tell. I don't think aliens are anymore selfless or politically honest than we are. I mean, if we stopped waiting for a providential leader to solve all our problems and started working on the system itself, I'm sure new paths would open up. That's why being in such close contacts with so many new civilizations is a good opportunity. And a great risk. But let's keep the glass half full for now."

"As you said, time will tell."

"On second thought, I don't think we can afford it. Time, that is."


	5. Citadel 1

**THE BEAUTIFUL INDIFFERENT**

Chapter 02, Part 1/4 (Citadel)

* * *

"_I call, call upon you, Sun!_

_To have you remember,_

_Remember, remember Siri!_

_When in the sweetest hour,_

_Among flowers, you took her!_

_Among flowers […]"_

_**Fragment 41 of the **_**Song**_**, a krogan epic, author unknown (8200 BCE, approx.)**_

**Translator's note:** Unfortunately, the passage that comprises the seven lines composing fragment 41 is so severely mutilated that we cannot reconstruct any precise context. However, it clearly alludes to a particular episode of the myth of Siri, that of her rape by Sun, son of Light, who ravishes her as she is picking up flowers in the fields, alone, by the end of the afternoon. Despite its brevity, the variant offered here is remarkable for several reasons. Firstly, despite the use of the third person, we are led to believe that this is Siri herself addressing Sun, not only because it would make little sense for another character, either from the rest of the narrative or from different versions of the myth, to command him to recall the event or to bring it up at all, but also because two other fragments – 13 and 107 – present us with a character clearly switching from the first to the third person when referring to themselves. Many krogan myths and legends depict a divine figure forcing themselves upon a young female, often leading to the birth of a child destined for greatness, in success or failure, and some poems even give voice to the female's distress in the form of a lament or a plea to a different divinity, for solace or, more rarely, vengeance. Never a direct address such as this one. Secondly, fragment 41, referred to as "Siri's imprecation" in most scholarly papers, is unique in that Siri is the only 'victim' to ever express indignation, hate even, and to be so certain that she has been wronged by the divinity – who, as such, isn't bound by the same rules or morality as earthly beings and doesn't have to justifiy or answer for any action, even a crime – that she holds him accountable and dares him to listen. If there ever was doubt concerning the tendency of archaic krogan poets and thinkers to put their own religious beliefs to the test, and use myth and legend as a reflexive tool, this passage alone would prove instrumental in dispelling it.

* * *

"I thought I told you to be in uniform."

Shepard glanced at her outfit, knowing that doing so made her look like a child caught wearing her mother's underwear. She was dressed in the regular off-duty clothes every recruit was provided with, simple, warm and comfortable, with deep pockets to tuck one's hands in. She felt much better that way than parading in a tight armor with a shotgun biting into her lower back. Alenko and Williams were looking at her, and she focused on her own fingers moving idly in her hoodie's pocket. Anderson's jaw clenched in frustration. He was exasperated, and ugly, so she looked elsewhere. She had fallen asleep under the shower, all tension cleansed out of her body, her thoughts dissipating into restful fatigue.

"Go change. The Ambassador's waiting for us, I want you back here, geared up, in five minutes."

She shook her head. "I'm going like this."

For a fraction of a second and before his face went steel hard, Anderson looked baffled. She focused on what she could see through the Normandy's bow window, just a stretch of wall. Whether it was close or distant, she couldn't tell, there was nothing to give it a scale. She supposed the docking bay was rather bare and practical. She wasn't present when they approached the Citadel, or when Joker brought the ship in to dock. She had heard Williams describe the _Destiny Ascension_, the Citadel's flagship, and would have loved to see it too, to watch the station piercing through the Serpent Nebula. But the thought of sharing this with curious marines crowding the bow had ruined the prospect.

"You are not. Go change, that's an order."

Eyes unwillingly landing on Anderson's face, she shook her head again with a slight shrug. Just a feeling, a flight of fancy disguised as intuition perhaps, that he no longer had a say, and should something happen to her, something good, should someone take an interest in the Eden Prime debacle, be they the Ambassador, the Council, corporations, it didn't matter what Anderson thought of her conduct. Although, she did know that it could end today, that she could cross one line too many. He could shit a brick over protocol. Insubordination. She also knew the beacon was a solid reason to be considered traumatized, written off as mentally unstable in her file. She knew, of all the possibilities, of how quickly an existence could veer off. Why was she risking it? The matter of the uniform was insignificant, but the closer the edge, the stronger the need to look down below and see just how high it was, how radical the fall. To know it was a mistake and to do it anyway, to do it because it was a mistake, no rebellion, but the urge to just how far she could go. It was at times like these that her difficulty to grasp her own life firmly, to turn vague desires into objectives and give herself the means to achieve those goals, felt most acute. Couldn't see the bigger picture, didn't know if there even was such a thing. Having to decode the signs and find a place for herself in this cacophony, sensing the whispers. Anderson was saying something, she pushed it out of her mind and ears. She didn't know what it was about this unexpected opening in Special Tactics that beckoned her so. What promise she would have it hold.

"Shepard!"

She looked at him.

"Did you hear a word of what I just said?"

"No." She saw a hint of concern alter his face, or maybe it was just a frown.

"I said I would normally strip you of your command, report on your behavior and remove you from the crew until further notice. But given the circumstances, we're going to go see the Ambassador as planned, and then I will request a psych evaluation. Consider yourself on probation until then. No assignments, no uniform, no weapons. Chief, make sure the Commander isn't carrying any."

Shepard blinked a few times. She felt the urge to tell him she didn't need an actual weapon to turn his organs into shreds with one biotic warp, but the impulse passed as quickly as it had come. Her eyes met Williams', who took a few steps in her direction.

"Please put up your arms, Commander."

She obeyed, nursing that old fantasy of having things taken out of her hands for good, like that empty little boat, drunk on the waves it danced on. But things were always so grey, and freedom of choice so persistent. Williams looked mortified, feeling the weight of possibility in her own terms, perhaps, or just embarrassed. Shepard would never know what was going on in the young woman's mind, but she would have liked to see herself through those dark eyes.

* * *

Ashley bit her lower lip when she realized she had to unzip Shepard's hoodie herself, since she'd just asked the woman to raise her arms. She couldn't decide if it was humiliating, degrading, or just plain weird. She wasn't even officially transferred to the Normandy yet, and here she was, searching Commander Shepard. She slid her hands between the jacket and the shirt, and swallowed her discomfort as she began to pat Shepard's waist and back. It was so close to the skin, such a thin fabric. _Naked doesn't mean vulnerable, be as firm with a suspect coming out of the shower as with an armored terrorist_, Ashley remembered those lessons. This wasn't the Academy, though. She couldn't be stone-faced and firm, or shake that uneasy feeling to be wearing a plated suit, with those cold, hard gloves, when Shepard just had a goddamn shirt on.

She had to glance at her face eventually when she started patting her arms, one after the other, and she wasn't expecting Shepard to be looking at her so intently. They were so unpleasantly close, too. Barely inches apart. Ashley felt her face grow hot, her intestines tightening the way they did whenever she got scolded by a superior. The image of Shepard munching on her food in silence a couple of hours ago crossed her mind, and also that look she'd been wearing as Anderson argued over her lack of uniform. The woman looked like she'd been thrown at the wolves ever since she had left the infirmary. The thought that she was molesting a little girl, or maybe a lunatic teenager who didn't fit in, crossed Ashley's mind. A teenager with full lips and eyes that said something in a language Ashley obviously didn't speak. It was the first time she had Shepard's full attention like that. Her gaze was unreadable and yet so completely open that Ashley felt like she was the one being searched and cornered.

She let out a barely audible sigh of relief when she escaped those clouded eyes and knelt to pat the woman's legs through her trousers. She caught a whiff of soap or shampoo, and some other, warmer scent, that of skin. The best place to smell someone's unique olfactory identity was behind the ear, and the crook of the neck, or so she'd heard. Shepard wasn't carrying any weapon anyway, the whole thing was ridiculous. Well, no, better safe than sorry, and Anderson was just doing what he thought was best, maybe he even thought being searched would snap Shepard out of her torpor. But Ashley felt like she was violating Shepard's intimacy, breathing in her personal scent. Oh, she knew the woman was no angel, no helpless little girl (and even little girls could be bitches, she knew, she had three sisters). She was a butcher, and surviving as one of her teammates was almost harder than as her opponent, she was uncontrollable, her tactics were non-existent, she didn't know shit about grenades, and she could make you feel like she'd rather die than be nice to you. She was an ass.

Her hands on Shepard's left thigh, she raised her head without thinking. Shepard was still looking at her. _You're the asshole, Williams,_ Ashley's mind whispered as she was forced to acknowledge just how disturbingly lovely the girl looked, all blonde and pale and intense and so focused on her, Ashley Williams, gunnery Chief of the Normandy. _She only cares about herself. She won't help you if you're in a tight spot, you know that. She doesn't like you. But right now, for some reason, she's found something of interest within you, because she's looking at you as if nothing else mattered. It's fine disliking dangerous, lonely weirdos as long at they make you feel like shit, like you don't exist, but when they look at you like that, hell. Just like that, out of the blue, you're so special._

She got up, avoiding Shepard's eyes. "No weapon, Captain," she told Anderson.

"Then let's go."

As they exited the Normandy and stood before the elevator door, waiting for it to come up and take them from the pier to the station's bowels, or so Ashley supposed, she became aware that the itchy spot on her cheek that she'd been scratching for a few seconds was precisely where her tears had dried, about an hour before. Instantly, she felt a lump form in her throat. _Oh no, not again_. She bit her tongue as hard as she could ("_Bit your lip if you're trying not to laugh, your tongue if you feel you're gonna cry. Trust me, it works_," a valuable lesson she'd learnt from her sister Sarah, younger but wiser), trying to take her mind off of this dreadful, very specific feeling one got when trying to desperately suppress tears that kept welling up regardless. She'd cry her eyeballs out once she was alone in her bed, or pod, whatever. Not now, _please God not now_.

When the first crying fit had overwhelmed her, a few hours after leaving Eden Prime, she had thought it was her own reaction to the slaughter that had taken place back there. That no matter how tough she was or liked to believe she was, it was a somewhat healthy reaction. One she had carefully concealed. Then the second outburst has seized her, a little before their arrival at the Citadel. This time, she had wondered if her team's death, the carnage, had caused her some sort of shock she had yet to process. She settled for "probably" upon realizing her memory refused to unlock the doors. Doors to events she didn't even know how she felt about, she could see the blood and guts flying all around, and hear the screams, but it was all as distant and impersonal as a newsflash.

And now, stepping into this elevator, tongue still stuck between her teeth and that painful lump clogging her throat, she understood something. She understood it because one of the thoughts she threw at her own mind to try and distract it from those uninvited, incongruous tears, was that of her own luck. She had been begging for a shipboard posting for years, and there she was, on the jewel of the Alliance's fleet, under the command of their best Captain. And that was just it, wasn't it? She couldn't grieve for her dead team, because their death led her right where she wanted to be, and she couldn't rejoice either, she hated it all and loved it even more. She wept it out. _But please, not in this elevator_.

* * *

"I'm not going to steal anything, you know," Tali sighed. She was so tired. Her wound throbbed like waves, numbing her shoulder, her neck, her arm, from ear to fingertip. And she was hungry. So when she saw the asari clerk eyeing her for the fourth time since she'd stepped into the shop, she decided to speak up. She had meant for her words to carry the indignation that was burning the back of her neck, but all she could hear in her own voice was weariness. Stories were true, quarians weren't welcome anywhere outside the Flotilla.

The clerk averted her gaze and pretended to rummage through a pile of OSDs. _Good. Be embarrassed. That's what it feels like to be ashamed._ She could see the asari's cheeks turning a darker shade of blue, which she interpreted as a blush. _She's probably four hundred years old, don't kid yourself, what would she have to blush about?_ For an instant, Tali forgot her misery as she tried to guess the alien's age. The skin of her skull wasn't particularly scaly, so maybe she was pretty young. By asari standards, of course. The girl then turned her back on Tali to tinkle on some holographic keyboard, and all of a sudden the faint, background music that filled the store was replaced with a louder tune.

Tali guessed it was to be expected, given that the place was a music shop, but she felt so utterly ignorant. She was reading all those band names, her eyes jumping from one pile of OSDs to the next, recognizing nothing. She couldn't even identify the instruments used in the song that was playing. She knew nothing. She hated to wallow and brood, her father had taught her better, but hopelessness and homesickness were digging an icy hole in her chest. The Citadel's Wards were everything she had dreamed of and much more, and yet she felt like she was drifting from place to place, killing hours, enjoying none of what should have been an endless source of excitement to her. She was crippled by the pain, exhausted, famished, unsure of how she should use what little money she had, it was all loudness, hostile stares or loneliness among the crowd. She didn't belong. _Come on._ _You're seeing everything from a victim's standpoint because of this impossible mess you stuck yourself in. Once you get rid of that recording and get a nice sum for it on top of a safe place to rest, everything will be fine. It won't be in your hands anymore, and you can start living all this to the fullest. Right. I'll still be a pariah everywhere I go. Oh shut it, stop being so negative! You're not the first one to set out on your Pilgrimage, and you certainly won't be the last. Thousands have done it before, so get a grip._

She glanced at her omni-tool. It told her the exact same thing it had barely a minute before: that she had a gloomy number of hours to live through before her meeting with this club owner, the Shadow Broker's agent. As thrilling as all this adventure would have sounded to her, had she heard it as a tale when she was still on the Flotilla, being the protagonist was not nearly as enjoyable. She felt she had been entrusted with information that was way too big a burden. Information she had almost lost an arm to, at that! What a grand debut in the vast world for Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, daughter to the head of the Admiralty Board. Her bloated ego had used the weight of filial expectations as an excuse to tackle something that was beyond her league, and now she was paying a terrible price for it. _Silly Tali,_ her mother used to say. _I know, I know. Just calm down. You're not doing so bad, all things considered. Could have been worse. It's not like you have anywhere to be before the rendezvous, so chill out. Yep. Okay, so… music. Music all around. Surely you can find a couple of nice recordings to bring back home._

She raised her hand to wipe away a stray tear that had made its way up to the corner of her eye, but she hit her helmet's visor instead. She was still not used to wearing that environmental suit at all times. Still not used to dealing with the fact people could never see her expressions. It wasn't the first time she wore it, of course, and she was accustomed to seeing some of her birth ship's inhabitants dressed up like that even within the Fleet, but unlike what the outside world seemed to think, it wasn't the norm. It made her wonder if part of the stigma attached to quarians came from their opaque visors – which they wore to protect their eyes and skin from harsh light, ultraviolet rays and so on, – thus setting up an expressionless wall between themselves and other races. Voices, gestures, none of it was as immediate as a smile, even a krogan's lopsided one. Though, volus also wore environmental suits. But then, they weren't autarkic exiles, they hadn't accidentally unleashed an army of AIs upon the galactic community three centuries before.

She pushed away these thoughts, forbidding her mind to stray home, and focused hard on what she was hearing. It was actually a nice instrumental piece, very foreign to her (but then, what wasn't?). The endearing rhythms made random images blossom in her mind's eye. She was no stranger to the thrill or racing emotions good music could bring about, but this was all so new. She suddenly felt bold enough to approach the clerk, who was leaning towards another computer screen and looked rather absorbed in whatever she was watching.

"Excuse me," Tali said after a while, when it became obvious the asari wouldn't turn towards her. _What if she ignores me? Stop it. Don't think like that._ Tali was taken by surprise when the clerk nodded and gave her a smile, inviting her to speak. "I was wondering about the song that just played. What's it called?"

"You like it?" the asari asked, lazily resting her cheek in the palm of her hand. Her laid back attitude suddenly stopped feeling like rudeness.

"I do, it's the first time I hear something like this," Tali confessed, regretting it instantly.

The asari smiled again. "I'll get you the OSD, if you want to have a look," she said, walking around the counter towards a nearby shelf. Running her thin fingers along a row of discs, she ended up pulling a flat, colourful case out, and handed it over to Tali.

"Thanks."

"The room's downstairs, behind the curtain."

"The room?" Tali asked, confused. The asari blinked, probably unused to having to explain what 'the room' was.

"Well, most music stores have a special room where you can seat and listen to whatever strikes your fancy from one of the terminals. You can even have a drink, or lie down on one of the couches. If you find some songs or albums that you like, you give me the list and I can make you a custom OSD, or you can purchase some of the premade ones from this floor."

"But what if a customer stays indefinitely and buys nothing?"

The clerk shrugged good-naturedly. "That happens sometimes, but I don't mind as long as the room isn't full. It never is, in fact, even though it's pretty small. The longer someone stays, the more liable they are to find something they like, or get thirsty or hungry and buy something. All in all, everyone's happy. Is it your first time in the Wards?"

The question seemed to have been asked out of genuine curiosity, and Tali found herself more eager to break her solitude that she would have thought. "It's my first time out of the Flotilla. You know, the…," she began, suddenly wondering how widely known this aspect of quarian culture was. After all, most of her peers wouldn't be able to give more than a couple of other species' homeworlds' names, so why should the average asari or hanar know about the Flotilla? But how could they not?

"Are you on your Pilgrimage?"

"Well, yes. That's right. I didn't think anyone would know about it," she stammered.

The clerk smiled, rearranging a pile of OSDs distractedly. "I wouldn't say it's common knowledge, but once you've lived here for some time, you're bound to run into a few quarians. From what I understand, a part of your population has to leave the Migrant Fleet and only come back once they've found valuable resources, right?"

"Close. Traditionally, it's presented as a rite of passage into adulthood. Every quarian is sent out in search of something useful to bring back, to prove that they can contribute to the welfare of all and earn their place among a given crew, on a ship different from the one they were born and raised on. But in fact, it's not so much a ritual as is it a necessity, resources-wise and to avoid inbreeding. So, here I am."

"I guess a few albums won't earn you your return ticket, right?" the asari replied, eyebrows raised.

"Not really, no," Tali said, hoping her voice conveyed her amusement, acutely aware of just how unwelcoming this dark environmental suit made her look. She briefly wondered if her discomfort with her own appearance would be proportional to the level of intimacy she reached with those around her. Would ease and comfort come with closeness, or would it be the contrary? _Assuming you ever make non-quarian friends. Oh, leave me alone. Go cry in a corner._ "But everything is appreciated. Spare parts to repair the ships, helpful technology, all sorts of supplies, knowledge and entertainment… everything, really."

"The two quarians I met didn't sound like they meant to go back to the Fleet, though," the asari remarked, steadying a precarious tower of piled up cases with a fluid gesture of the arm. She moved seemingly effortlessly, in a discreet choreography the steps of which she must know by heart, focused on their conversation and yet getting so much done even as she spoke or listened, organizing shelves, taking out misplaced OSDs, a glance at their cover enough for her to know exactly where they belonged in the small, cluttered and rather homely shop.

"Some of us don't return. We're free to choose our own life, but in practice most consider the Flotilla their home and do come back, because… I guess, because it's not so easy out there."

"What about you?" the clerk inquired matter-of-factly. But her steady gaze told otherwise, and Tali was becoming rather self-conscious, thinking she might be speaking with a very, _very_ old creature. _She might be older than the Fleet itself._

"I want to go home. But I've only just left and there's so much I want to see, although I'm beginning to wonder if I'm really cut out for all this," Tali explained, keeping her voice as cheerful-sounding as possible.

"How long does an average Pilgrimage last?"

"A few standard years. Even once they've found something, a lot of us want to enjoy the experience to the fullest, since it most likely won't happen again once we're part of a new crew."

"Don't any of you attend university during your time outside the Fleet? Or maybe you already have some similar structures or schools within it? I'm sorry. Tell me if I'm being too inquisitive. You know what they say. Or perhaps you don't. About asari younglings being such insufferably curious, usually pole-dancing, wild… overheating batteries, or something. I'll just be quiet now," the asari added, making a face as her head popped up from behind the counter, under which she was rummaging through her stock.

"No, it's nice to talk to someone. How old are you?" Tali risked, relieved and slightly disappointed to find out her counterpart was a youngling, as she had put it. She couldn't remember what she'd been taught about the three stages of an asari's life. The last one was Matriarch, everyone knew that, but the first two... 'rosebuds'? No, too corny. Or was it -

"One hundred ninety four."

_Right_, Tali cringed inwardly. _That's one old rosebud_. "Oh. Enjoy your childhood while you can, I guess."

The asari let out a beautiful laugh. "I'll try. The apocalypse of adolescence and all that."

"It can be rough. But to answer your question, I'd never actually thought about university. I couldn't afford it, and besides I don't see why they would accept a quarian, but it does sound appealing."

"I can only speak about universities on asari territory, but they welcome students regardless of race. As for the financial issue, a lot of good colleges are funded by the Citadel or local governments, they're free."

"I didn't know," Tali murmured, her imagination already soaring. To discover a place of culture and knowledge, among the thinkers of tomorrow, to learn and study subjects that had nothing to do with ship maintenance… "Did you? Go to university, I mean?"

"That I did. I liked it for a while, but it wasn't a perfect match. I'm not really a scholar, at least not enough to write a thesis about the semiotics of tentacle-dancing in 13th century hanar religious drama. Which doesn't exist anyway, I just made it up. It's something to experience, though. Asari universities tend to build a lot of partnerships with alien colonies or distant worlds, they have students from every species and origins. I know the Migrant Fleet is very independent, but everyone could benefit from having some quarian students or teachers, I'm sure."

"It's interesting on paper, but I doubt anyone in the Flotilla would give it a second thought. The feeling of having been rejected by the galactic community is still fresh in the collective memory, there's a lot of resentment at having been stripped of our Embassy here on the Citadel, and forced into exile because the Council refused to come to our aid when the geth attacked. Altough some think we're isolating ourselves too much."

"What do _you_ think?"

"I honestly don't know. I'm very curious and eager to discover everything, but I did feel like a second-class citizen when Citadel Security interrogated me for three hours before they let me access the Wards."

The clerk gave her an apologetic look. "It would seem the trust has to be rebuilt on both sides."

Tali sighed silently. "Which is why I don't think our government would give a very high priority to building a partnership with an alien university, if they were willing to even consider it."

"It starts somewhere, though," the asari replied with a smile that seemed to hint at the inevitability of it.

* * *

"Captain," the Ambassador said, shaking Anderson's hand.

"Thank you for receiving us on such short notice."

"We are scheduled for a holo meeting with the Council in ten minutes, in this office. Lieutenant Alenko and Chief Williams, I presume?" he asked, his eyes going over Ashley and Kaidan, searching for something. Donnel Udina was the kind of man who thought ahead of his words, his hyperactive mind already forming the next question, never completely there. He had a lot to think about.

"Yes, Ambassador, I brought them here in case you had any questions."

"And this must be Shepard," Udina said slowly, ignoring Anderson. He had just spotted her, behind the other two. If he noticed her lack of uniform, he didn't show it. "Commander. I would have preferred to meet you in a more favorable situation, with a beacon in working order and a positive evaluation from Nihlus Kryik. But I read your subordinates' reports, I guess you did what you could given the circumstances. We don't have time for formalities, so I'll skip the pleasantries. Your Captain tells me you woke up too late to prepare your report, but I'm quite sure the Council will want you to explain what happened with the beacon. You will tell me first, before the hearing begins, and I'll select what to say to them and what should be left out for the time being. Hopefully, we can salvage what little remains of your chances of getting into Special Tactics."

He spoke fast, his voice grating and distinguished at the same time, eyebrows expectantly raised, eyes fixed upon Shepard. Kaidan saw Anderson tense up, as if he feared she might do something inappropriate. In a way she did, when she sat down into a curvy armchair without asking for anyone's permission, but she look tired, besides, she had deigned to give the Ambassador a nod. Kaidan suppressed a smile. She was a diplomatic terror.

"It might be quicker to read the Normandy's medical officer's report. I told her all I remember, I know she wrote it down," Shepard said blankly, rubbing her forehead.

Silence stretched.

"I hope you don't intend to say the same thing to the Council, Shepard. For your information, I read all the reports, and so did the Council. I want to hear it from you."

Once again, Kaidan wondered what the beacon had done to her. What she was feeling at the moment. Exhaustion? Physical discomfort? Something deeper? To see her slumped like this on her chair, he realized how rushed it all was. She should have been under close medical scrutiny, not dragged to a political meeting barely three hours after waking up from a coma. Would she break down? The thought had barely crossed his mind when she indirectly gave him an answer of her own.

"No. If you're right and the Council does ask me to tell the tale, you'll hear it soon enough."

Kaidan held his breath as the Ambassador glared at Anderson and was about to say something, but the Captain sprang into action before he had the chance, eyes shining with a fury that contradicted his usual, collected demeanor. "You're out of line, Shepard!" he exclaimed, closing the distance separating them, towering above her. He leaned over, putting his hands on the armrests. "You're going to do as you're told, cut the rebellious teenager crap and _obey_. This is a matter of galactic importance, and I'm sick of your bullshit. Keep going like this, Shepard, and I promise you, you'll never set foot on any Alliance vessel again," he threatened in a low voice.

Beneath the elegant and efficient ship Captain, there was still the soldier. Kaidan was suspended in anticipation, but a tiny part of his mind tried to imagine a younger Anderson, earning medal after medal on remote worlds. Weapons in hand, armor dirty and shields about to flicker and die on him, not standing at the bow of the Normandy in his night blue uniform. His face was barely a couple of inches away from Shepard's. What Kaidan saw in her eyes chilled him to the core.

"Don't push me," she whispered, her gaze holding Anderson's. Like a panther about to jump at his throat. The idea that she could kill him before he had the chance to draw out his weapon crossed his mind. All sorts of scenarios drifted before his eyes, he briefly wondered if he should intervene, dismissed it as ridiculous.

"Or?" Anderson asked. He hadn't moved, his expression and tone of voice were the same as before, but Kaidan sensed that his rage had passed and he was ready to deal with her less impulsively.

"I don't know. But you'll find out if you don't step back."

There was no defiance in her words.

"Enough!" Udina snapped in a surprising, baritone voice.

"Oh, I'll step back, Shepard. I have no interest in your little game, but whatever you do now, it's in the court-martial's hands. I can't take you back on the ship." And with that, he rose up to his full height again and took a step back. Shepard reclined against the back of the armchair.

"My little game?" she said. For the first time, Kaidan detected a hint of exasperation. "If you could see yourselves, either tangled in meaningless protocol, or your ambition flailing in all the wrong directions, to the point you want to double-check what I'll tell the Council, in case it doesn't fit in your grand schemes," and at that she gave a frustrated, dismissive wave to nothing in particular.

"What on earth is that all about, Anderson?" Udina asked, furious, a sheen of sweat gleaming on his brow. Only a few minutes left before the holo transmitters came to life. To a man like Udina, every opportunity for advancement was as though his life were on the line, humanity's interests at stake. Kaidan, his mind working to analyze what had just transpired, wondered what it really took for one not to play games, political or otherwise. Was she truly not playing a game? Who was she?

"What happened to you, Shepard?" Anderson sounded worn-out, as if after anger came disbelief, disappointment, regret perhaps.

She wasn't looking at him, head turned towards the open side of the office, a windowless bay of rustling leaves masking the artificial sky and lake as well the aerial, immaculate buildings of the Presidium. A ring of nature and calm at the heart of a city of millions, a ring for its elite, where heavy decisions were made in a light, tasteful 0.3 gravity. She didn't answer.

* * *

"We weren't able to retrieve much from the synthetics' carcasses. It appears that each of them was programmed to destroy their memory core should too big a threat arise. Out of the few dozens we found all over the colony, none had any data left. Their design, however, suggests they might be of geth origin, thus corroborating your suspicions, Captain. Although if we are right, they have been significantly altered since the last time they were seen on this side of the Perseus Veil. As for that dreadnought, we had several specialists study the footage you transmitted to us, but it seems completely alien, we have never seen such a mothership before. If those synthetics created it, it would mean they have evolved beyond us. Which is of course preoccupying." The holo representation of the salarian Councilor went quiet.

Shepard was fascinated by the quality of the transmission: the Council _was_ in Udina's office. The colors were different, their bodies partly translucent, but their moves, their voices, the perfect stability of the contours… Shepard had seen a few flickering VIs, very good three-dimensional representations, but none of them could compete with this level of realism. She wondered how she, herself, appeared to the Council.

"What course of action have you decided to adopt regarding this… incident?" Udina asked, his courteous tone coating his convoluted choice of words.

"There is nothing we can do, besides mobilizing our intel-gathering services in that direction."

"What do you mean, there is nothing you can do? Human colonies are in danger, you have to act," he replied, a harder edge discernible in his voice. Shepard didn't know what to think of him, he seemed preoccupied, but whether this concern stemmed from personal ambition, a will to protect humanity's interests, or both, she didn't know. She felt he was treading a very narrow path, swinging from respectfulness to irritation disturbingly quickly.

The turian Council member was quicker to reply than his asari counterpart. "No, Ambassador, we don't _have _to do anything. Whatever those things were, geth or otherwise, they were most likely here for the beacon, not because Eden Prime was a human colony. We are willing to take part in the reconstruction effort, but as things are now we don't see the need for more drastic measures."

"That's very charitable of you, but the Alliance isn't asking for financial support to rebuild the colony, we can handle this. What we want is protection."

"As we said, unless we have further proof that human colonies are specifically targeted, we have no reason to dispatch military forces around your settlements," the asari Councilor replied, her voice harmonious, yet firm. Shepard had an urge to go around the holo transmitters to observe the back of her skull. She could see the graceful wave of those unfamiliar folds, but she wanted to observe how they sculpted her neck.

She was also interested in the way the three Council members managed to speak for one another as though they had some way to consult the other two before saying something. Maybe they were surprisingly united. Or very good at appearing so. Perhaps they were at each other's throats constantly when they weren't speaking publicly, but Shepard doubted it. She couldn't help but feel Udina was rather agitated in comparison to them. Humanity's reputation wasn't one of calm pros and cons-weighing. How strange though, for a race to have a reputation, main features. Before meeting all these alien societies, thinkers had of course generalized about humanity as a whole, but diversity remained. And if the galactic community was to come into contact with something, a form of life unimaginable, one that differed from any known alien race in so radical a way, would this galactic community appear as a whole, with its distinctive traits?

"It can't be a one-way street with humanity settling on remote, difficult worlds, expanding Council space for you, but not receiving any help when things go wrong."

"Clearly we don't share the same vision," the turian Councilor replied, not bothering to hide a hint of disdain. "Humanity chose to settle on Eden Prime, a world dangerously close to the Terminus Systems. You were warned and took your responsibilities, but that's not the problem we're here to discuss. For the last time, Ambassador, Eden Prime appears to have been attacked because of the beacon. If our services report a threat to human colonies, we will take action. Not before."

Shepard could see Udina clenching his fists behind his back as he faced his interlocutors. "And of course, the fact it's a human colony has nothing to do with your reluctance to act," he said slowly.

"Be careful what you're implying, Ambassador," the asari said sharply.

Udina shook his head slightly, as if to say, _things never chang_e. "What about Saren Arterius, then?"

It was the salarian Councilor who answered. "One of our C-Sec agents is investigating Nihlus Kryik's death. We have scheduled another hearing for the day after tomorrow, during which he will present his findings."

"Two days? What could a C-Sec detective come up with in so short a time! It takes more than that to dig into a Spectre's dirty business, you know this as well as I do."

"Which is why," the turian said, exasperated, "our agent has access to all classified information we possess on Arterius' previous missions. Should he require the cooperation of our secret services, it will be granted to him. But you can't seriously expect us to launch a full-scale investigation for an indefinite amount of time, because a traumatized dockworker, who happens to be a smuggler, claims to have seen our best Spectre shoot another one in the head."

"You're not investigating Arterius' motives! You're questioning a witness' account because he happens to be familiar with the black market, and when your agent turns up empty-handed at the hearing, your best Spectre, as you put it, will walk away cleared of charges you haven't even seriously considered!"

"Enough, Ambassador Udina! Listen to yourself. If a turian smuggler accused, say, Captain Anderson of having killed a renowned general of the Alliance fleet, what would you do?" the Councilor waved impatiently. "But this is preposterous. We have no time to waste on such impulsive claims."

The asari Councilor intervened. "The results of the investigation will be discussed at the hearing, we will say no more on this matter."

"Let us talk about what we've scheduled the present meeting for. We've all read the various reports that were made concerning the attack on Eden Prime. One was missing though, Commander Shepard's." And at that, the salarian turned his head towards her, and Shepard quickly felt three pairs of virtual, alien eyes on her. The weight of their full attention dawned on her. Udina turned around, and with a discreet move of his head, seemed to give her a warning. "We understand you were in no medical condition to report before you arrived on the Citadel. Is there anything you wish to add that hasn't been detailed by your colleagues?"

Shepard glanced at Udina. She wasn't afraid of him, and yet she began to sweat. Maybe she was afraid, by the crushing importance she was suddenly being given, or perhaps by this dark, twisting worm gnawing at her mind, a poisonous horror that had been dwelling there ever since she had woken up. What if the horror was already there, and the Prothean artifact had simply unveiled it? She got a few strands of hair out of her eyes.

"No, their accounts are accurate. I haven't read the Normandy's doctor's report, though, after I told her what had happened with the beacon."

"She noted that you mentioned a terrible pain upon being 'sucked in' by the beacon. That you were brought on board in a light coma, during which your brain seems to have been unusually active, and she stressed that the origin of the pain you described was hard to determine. Nightmares, the beacon itself, she doesn't know. Lastly, she writes that you were in shock when you woke up, although it didn't last. That's about it. Does her account seem relevant to you, Commander?" the asari asked. Her voice was made even softer by the contrast it offered with the turian's, strong and metallic, and Udina's single-string, strangled one.

Shepard felt weary, reluctant to let her thoughts wander back then. She would do it though, if only because she had to negotiate a perilous jump, a shift in her loyalties. She could sense Udina's eyes on her, he was tensed to a breaking point. What to do? She couldn't even assess whether she had something to lose in all this. _Cards on the table_. But what if it led her nowhere, what if all she had accomplished so far was dynamiting all the paths offered to her? _Just say the truth, pretend to earn any reward to come. _

"I don't know. I trust her medical opinion, although my own experience was quite different."

"If you can, we would like you to describe it. It's likely to be the only information we can get out of the beacon, given its current state, so please try to be thorough."

Shepard swallowed silently. "I have no idea what it did to me. I can't say whether it brought something new, or amplified elements that were already there. All I can say if that I've never experienced anything close to the pain it caused me."

The Council was quiet for a moment, and then the asari spoke again. "What sort of pain was it?"

Shepard wished she could sit again. But the armchairs were far from the transmitters, and she didn't know how wide their range was. She rubbed her brow, feeling something rise within, the vague echo of what the beacon had shown her. Sickening. She let out a barely audible, shuddering breath. "It's somehow like…, I don't know. It's difficult to explain," she faltered, hands trembling.

Udina seized the opportunity. "You don't look good, Commander. You've done your part by coming to this hearing in spite of your condition, and I'm certain the Council will have no objections to your going back to the ship to get the rest and medical attention you need."

_Son of a bitch. Okay. It's going to be all right, just say the truth, stick to it. Don't try anything. _She saw the asari exchange a glance with the turian, wondered what it meant.

"If you do not feel well enough to pursue this meeting, we won't ask you to stay at the cost of your health. If you can wait a few more minutes before going back to the Normandy though, we would be interested in anything you can tell us about the beacon," the Councilor said, her voice level, calm seeping through it like droplets falling from rainforest trees.

"I can stay, I'll just take a seat." _Now_. "Besides, I'm not allowed access to the Normandy anymore."

There a was a moment of perplexed silence from the Council, as Shepard dragged a seat across the room and sat on it, a couple of meters away from the transmitters.

"Why is that, Captain?" the turian asked Anderson.

The latter was about to answer, but Udina outstripped him. "This is a military matter we are still sorting out, you will be informed once we've reached a conclusion, of course."

"You will tell us now, Ambassador. Nihlus Kryik died before he could evaluate Commander Shepard, but her candidacy is still on hold. We are the ones who will inform you once we've decided what course of action to take on this, not the other way round."

Shepard froze. She was still in the race. Did it mean that she would definitely be ruled out after the news of her uncooperative behavior reached the Council's ears? Her stomach tightened. It was uncomfortable, to have one's future put into strangers' hands, and yet know that every move could influence it. She didn't know how to tip the scales or pray for indifference.

Udina sighed, and he looked defeated, as if he was giving up on something or switching to a different strategy. He shrugged. "The Commander is showing serious signs of insubordination."

"Insubordination?" the turian Councilor repeated, and Shepard couldn't tell the surprise from the shock in his voice.

"You tell them, Anderson, you know more than I do about the situation."

Anderson stepped forward. Shepard was beginning to feel herself disappear from the room, and wondered if it was an inkling of how she would be feeling when her case was discussed by the court-martial judges. _It'll be much worse than that_. The sensation of invisibility was beginning to overwhelm her, disturbing, when she noticed the asari Councilor looking at her. She held her gaze as Anderson's voice rose from behind her.

"The Commander refused to acknowledge orders, questioned them, and clearly stated her profound disagreement with some of the Alliance's policies. I will request a psych evaluation be performed since I can't say to what extent the beacon is affecting her judgment. Depending on the results, measures will be taken, court-martial or otherwise," he explained, calm and controlled.

The turian turned his head towards Shepard, but said nothing. He then looked at the other Councilors, exchanged a glance with the asari, who turned to the salarian. He gave her a discreet nod.

"Ambassador, we wish to speak to Commander Shepard privately, with your permission of course," the asari requested.

Udina was silent one second too many. "With all due respect, Councilors, Shepard is under Captain Anderson's command, and I represent them both. Is there any reason why I should not be present during this conversation?"

"This affair goes beyond any species taken individually, we don't want to speak to the Commander as a member of the Alliance military, but as a key-witness in a matter of intergalactic security. Therefore, our authority over Commander Shepard supersedes that of Captain Anderson as well as yours, and we feel confidentiality to be necessary with regards to the present situation." The turian's voice was dry as a whip.

The asari softened the blow. "Understand, Ambassador, this is simply how we proceed in such matters to ensure that a witness will speak freely, without pressure, true or supposed, from their superiors. We won't keep her long."

Shepard saw the battle Udina was waging with himself, his jaw clenched, brow furrowed. "Very well. If that's how you _proceed_."

* * *

"_Next you'll tell me you like poetry, right?" he said, puffing some cigarette smoke an inch away from her face._

"_Stories. All kinds of stories."_

"_Such a sensitive girl, huh? Wreaking havoc during training like you got some pent-up rage or something, but deep down you're a softie."_

_She lowered her head, resting her cheek against her arm._

"_What's the dreamy look for?" he asked with a grin._

"_Earth."_

"_Ah, you homesick?"_

"_Not really. Just thinking of Earth."_

"_Nothing wrong with missing your home or your parents, you know."_

_She nodded, closing her eyes for a moment._

"_So what's it like back home, you got any siblings?"_

"_Not that I know of. I grew up on the streets, I don't know where my parents are."_

"_Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know."_

"_It's okay."_

"_What was it like? If you don't mind talking about it, I mean, I understand if you don't want to."_

_People often seemed overwhelmed by compassion when she told them she was a street kid, as if it meant she had gone through things they could barely imagine. Only, what they couldn't imagine was how soft a ride her childhood and adolescence had been. Her boat rocking this way and that, gently, hardships melting before the skiff could brush against them. How to convey this?_

"_Nothing remarkable about it. The city was like a playground, it was all a game."_

"_A game? Must have been a pretty dangerous one, at times, a little girl alone like that…" _

_Shepard stretched a little._

"_It didn't feel like it. Nice game, nothing bad came out of it."_

"_I guess this is as good a way to cope as any. You never got seriously hurt, though?"_

_She sighed inwardly. All the muscles in her body were warm after an afternoon of intensive training, and she just wanted to lie down. She could sense thoughts and memories tugging at her mind, putting her in a pleasant daze. She liked going to bed in the evening, when all was done and the only thing left to accomplish was to untie the moorings of the night._

* * *

"You were telling us of the difficulty to explain the effect the beacon had on you," said the asari once Shepard was alone in the office.

"I was," she murmured. It was peculiar, just like that, all tension dissolved – it didn't bring relief, but such calm. She could ear the leaves caressed by a gentle draught. Was it artificial too? So she would be court-martialed. The accusations weren't serious enough to allow imprisonment, so no matter what the court's verdict was, she would just leave. Start anew somewhere. Such a heart-warming mirage, to imagine herself drifting, carrying nothing but the weight of an appeased past, ready to see the world and open up, neither disappointing nor expecting, surprised in the best of ways, a different pace, happiness left untouched, to lie and to lie well.

"Commander?"

She snapped out of it and nodded, focusing on the transmitters.

"We would like to hear about this pain you mentioned, was it physical, psychological?" the salarian asked.

"I felt like I was being given a killing blow over and over again, I can't say it was physical, I don't remember. There were no images, just repeated agony. I can't recall, there's just a part of my memory that freezes in… fear, every time I try to remember. It's shutting me off," she explained, words rushing out laboriously.

"Perhaps it will come back, given time. Some experts have a theory about the purpose of Prothean beacons, which we will impart to you, but please continue for now. You said you didn't know whether it had brought something alien within you, or simply given you access to deeper parts of your own psyche, is that it?"

Shepard took a couple of seconds to observe the asari before answering. She had a feeling that there was a certain absence of judgment in the Councilor's questions, perhaps because her species was a long-lived one that viewed time differently, stripped of the unnecessary. Or she was just very controlled. Both. Shepard leaned back and looked at the trees.

"It felt utterly alien, but then so does the 'the other within', as they say," she trailed off, wishing she had settled for a simple 'yes'. Irony, wittiness, didn't suit her. Breathing in deeply, she could even smell the leaves. It was exquisite.

"Well, perhaps this will be an element of response", the salarian said. "Some of the experts we've contacted think that Prothean beacons might have been designed to transmit messages directly into the mind of the receiver. Of course, as with all Prothean-related matters, nothing is based on fact or solid evidence," he went on.

"If that theory is accurate, the pain you felt could have been a reaction to being subjected to information meant for a Prothean mind. Or, it could be that the message's purpose was to convey this pain itself. I'm afraid we have no way to know," the asari concluded with a graceful wave of her hand.

"We would like to be informed should you notice any changes, or remember something else. Now, before we conclude this meeting," the turian added, "is there anything you wish to tell us concerning this… disagreement mentioned earlier by your Captain? We will ask him, as well as the Ambassador, to give us more details since it might be of influence regarding your candidacy for the Spectres, but we thought you might want to give us your opinion first."

_Here we are. _

"When I woke up, a few hours ago, Captain Anderson told me of his suspicions about the geth and this rogue agent of yours. I wasn't convinced."

"Why?"

Shepard took an uneasy breath. "A far-fetched conspiracy theory, was what it sounded like to me. And I may have spoken too openly about what I thought of the Alliance's… aspirations, for humanity. When we arrived at the Citadel and prepared to go ashore, I refused to put on a uniform because, "she paused, searching for the right words, "I made me feel uncomfortable. Captain Anderson suspended me pending a psych evaluation, in case the beacon was affecting my behavior."

"Do you think it was, Commander?"

"Not that I can tell, but maybe I'm not aware of it. I suspect it was just that so far, I didn't mind obeying orders that had no meaning to me, or working for a system I don't believe in, because I had nowhere better to be. And then your Spectre came, he told me I might have a chance to join the Special Tactics and Reconnaissance branch, and for a while I was willing to work towards this. It felt like a good way of… expanding my horizons, beyond the Alliance's colonial interests. I was never a very good soldier."

"Interesting, but I assume Captain Anderson didn't mention your being court-martialed because you refused to put on a uniform, did he?" the turian asked. All three of them were unreadable, most of their features alien, a nice respite.

"When we arrived here, the Ambassador asked me to tell him about what had happened with the beacon, so that he could decide what I would or would not tell you. I refused. Captain Anderson reacted strongly, and I said too much, again. About their attitudes. He said I would be court-martialed."

"We will confirm all of this, but your cooperation has been noted. One thing, though," the turian Councilor said. Shepard looked at him, noticing how the asari systematically turned to whomever was speaking, unlike the other two. "Do you feel no loyalty at all for your species?"

"No. No loyalty, but interest, for some aspects of our history, our many cultures. I feel the same way about other species. I don't see why I should work towards getting humanity a seat on your Council, I understand the practical need for it to be species-based, but… in fact I'm not sure I even see 'humanity' at all. Shifting groups, individual trajectories."

"And why did you choose a military career, if you had no belief in humanity as a species?" the salarian asked. Shepard saw the turian's mandibles twitch, the way Kryik's had.

"I felt I was more or less done with my life on Earth as it was, I wanted to do something else. See space, different beings. The army was the only way out I could think of."

"Thank you Commander, that will be all," said the asari, her voice and tone softening the abruptness of the dismissal. "We will inform you of our decision, which should be made once we've talked to Ambassador Udina and Captain Anderson again."

* * *

When Shepard reached the lobby after her discussion with the Council, Udina and Anderson were already walking towards the wing hosting their Embassy.

"Alenko and Williams are waiting for you down there," the Captain said as they passed her. Shepard slowed down a little. She knew what he meant was that Alenko and Williams were there to make sure she didn't stray too far. She shook her head slightly and rummaged through her hoodie's right pocket for her cigarette pack and lighter.

"Commander," the Lieutenant nodded when she got close enough.

She glanced at her guardians while lighting her cigarette – the soft breeze made it difficult, – and walked out of the building. Like the human Embassy, it was completely open to the Presidium, blending the outside and the inside, the public and the semi-private. The Presidium seemed built around the fantasy of transparency, no doubt because as the political and economical power center of Citadel space, that image was most needed to conceal the inevitable dirt it certainly had to soil its hands with, in order to make the worlds go round.

"I'm sorry Commander, but Captain Ander- " Williams began, her voice firm.

"I'm not going anywhere," Shepard murmured, leaning against the railing after having crossed the elegant walk running along the length of the building. Silently, Alenko and and Williams joined her, one on each side.


	6. Citadel 2

**THE BEAUTIFUL INDIFFERENT**

Chapter 02, Part 2/4 (Citadel)

* * *

"_Hitting the relay in three…"_

_Captain Sadi Ashab didn't bother looking out the window, she knew there was nothing to see, and glanced at her pilot instead. Her insides tightened. The possibility of a surprise attack in lieu of the official welcoming delegation was rather unlikely, but the _Eleusis_ was the first Alliance ship to come into peaceful contact with an alien vessel, and Sadi wasn't sure what to expect. It wasn't even a cultural gap to be bridged with time and effort, it was-_

"_Two."_

_-the first of many attempts to determine whether the human race possessed the ability to adapt to a world that thrived without it, whether humanity had anything to offer to minds and cultures that had endured for so long. Aliens. The word itself was loaded with connotations and images that probably had little to do with what Ashab was about to be greeted by. At least the flock of ships expecting the _Eleusis_ on the other side of the relay wasn't part of the turian fleet, this alien Council being, it seemed, civil enough to handle the arrival of the Alliance with diplomatic consideration. They were to be welcomed and escorted from the relay to this massive space station they called the heart of Council space, the Citadel, by a party of asari ships. How was Sadi supposed to deal with this species? She knew so little. Most of them centuries old, an all-female race with blue skin and a disturbingly human-like facial and body structure. It was the officious reason why-_

"_One."_

_-she was the one to have been chosen for this very first meeting. The Alliance's ship captains were mostly men, and a heated argument had arisen in regards to who should be sent to meet the asari. The quarrel had almost degenerated into the realm of political incorrectness, with a few participants openly admitting to preferring to send a male captain so as to offer a strong face for humanity, as well as introduce those asari women, if one could call them that, to a reality they would need to get used to rather quickly if lasting diplomatic relations were to be established: human males. Others thought that, on the contrary, it was important to stress similarities between the two species, to begin the long process of harmonizing fundamentally different minds, starting from as familiar and common a ground as possible. Given the power of the Council, and how slim the chances were for the Alliance to earn a comfortable place among those races should humanity not be considered with a friendly eye to begin with, it had thus been decided that a woman would be the first human the asari would see in the flesh. Two thirds of the crew was composed of men, and two of them were to follow her closely on the bridge that would be extended between the _Eleusis_ and the main asari vessel for formal greetings. Sadi exhaled a trembling breath._

"_Jump."_

_**From **_**Tales of the Sightless Sea**_**, Tome VI (chap. 12), the well-known novelization of humanity's spacefaring history by Sola. It is generally admitted that no major liberty was taken with historical truth, which is why a good number of passages can be found in human students' textbooks. It should be noted that the present excerpt was written by Sola with the collaboration of Sadi Ashab herself, who agreed to offer her help in the retelling of this major episode in the history of interracial relations. Lira Sadhana, the asari captain who first greeted the **_**Eleusis**_**, provided Sola with her side of the story as well. Both captains are said to have formed a lasting friendship in the years that followed.**_

* * *

"I don't know what you told them," Udina said, closing his arms, "but you're still in the race for Special Tactics. Having someone like you under their command, someone who shows no attachments, won't use her position as a Spectre to further her people's interests… the ideal candidate, isn't that right, Shepard?"

She shifted uncomfortably. Impatiently, perhaps. Every time Kaidan looked at her, she appeared a little more detached from her military identity. He wasn't sure this feeling came from knowing that it was rather unlikely she would resume her duties aboard the Normandy anytime soon, or from her demeanor itself. She was leaning against the parapet, her fingers playing with her hair – a habit of hers. Was she aware of it? There was something slender and feminine about her, something that had little to do with clothes or other commonly accepted signs.

"Of course," Udina went on, "it's quite a risk for them as well. A risk I'm not sure they'll be willing to take ultimately. You're too shifty, Shepard, sooner or later you'll have to make things clear, otherwise no one will trust you."

"A life lesson I'm sure you've learned the hard way, Ambassador."

Udina pinched his lips, a twinkle of irony is his eyes. "As long as you're of some interest to the Council, therefore to the Alliance, I'm obliged to aid you. Which includes preventing you from blowing everything just because you suddenly decided you had a problem with authority. It'll lead you nowhere." As Kaidan's eyes flew from the Ambassador to Shepard, he became aware that she was looking in his own direction. There was something serious about her. Grave, even. _Enjoying the spectacle, you vulture?_ she seemed to say. Or perhaps she wasn't saying anything and it was Kaidan's own feelings whispering in his mind. He held her gaze, hoping his eyes were devoid of guilt or defiance. He had the distinctive impression that as unpleasant as Shepard was, she would have the utmost disdain for him if she got it into her head that he was, deep down, glad to witness this unprecedented, quiet mutiny of one of the Alliance's living jewels. _That, or she doesn't give a damn. _He wondered whether it would be better for him to be disliked, but noticed, or ignored altogether. Both were out of his comfort zone when it came to this woman, who made no effort to dissipate a misunderstanding Kaidan was struggling to put his finger on. "The instant the Council turns away from you," Udina went on, "and they will, when they realize who you are, or more specifically who you're not, you're on your own, Shepard." His tone was casual, _nothing personal, it's just how this game is played_, something along those lines.

For a moment, Kaidan imagined all the searing replies she could give him. He had no personal grudge against Udina, and he didn't particularly like the Commander, but he felt like the spectator to a fine play, anticipating, taking sides, his opinions shifting from one line to the next, all from the safety of his comfortable seat. But Shepard, true to her parsimonious ways, didn't answer. Kaidan caught her unfocused, wandering glances to her surroundings. There was not the slightest wrinkle on her forehead, as though she never frowned. In fact, she did look something of a thoughtful child. She appeared to be many things, this changing surface reflecting itself in the eye of the beholder. Maybe she was, in fact, remarkably steadfast, following a disturbing, steady course, disturbing enough for others to paint her with a myriad of colors that weren't hers n the first place. Nothing truly had a color, an intrinsic color, it all depended on the type of light that was being cast on a particular object. Grass is green. Grey in the morning, brown in the dusk, but one retained the faulty impression that underneath those passing nuances, the green remained.

"You will hold a parallel investigation here on the Citadel, see if you can find out anything about Saren Arterius' doings. I know the C-Sec agent who is already on the case will turn up empty-handed at the hearing, so we need to find something, anything, that would enable us to demand a full-scale investigation. You won't have any official powers, but it's the only thing we can do. It's in your interest as well, Shepard. If nothing, not even a shred of evidence against Arterius is presented to the Council in two days, your candidacy for the Spectres will likely be put on hold for a _very_ long time, at best."

Anderson took over when Udina was finished speaking. "I know you have your doubts regarding Arterius' involvement, but it's the only lead we have. Alenko and Williams will come with you and help in any way you see fit. They're under your command but they will report to me every hour. You know what it means."

Silence stretched, all eyes on Shepard. She took a deep, silent breath. "I don't. Why would you entrust me with this investigation? I have no knowledge of the Citadel, no contacts, no idea where to look or how to get behind closed doors. Surely you must have agents better suited for the job."

Kaidan could have sworn he saw a flash of relief in Anderson's dark eyes. He suspected that behind their confident or exasperated assertions, neither him nor the Ambassador really had a clue what to expect from Shepard, how to handle her when she refused to cooperate. Kaidan hadn't known her for long, but before the Eden Prime debacle, it hadn't sounded like she was known for questioning orders. Quite the contrary. In fact, she hadn't seemed to be known for anything in particular, setting her Torfan reputation aside. Neither friendly nor hostile, she kept to herself. There was grace to her everyday movements, and even the way she spoke denoted a certain level of education. She wasn't cold, but Kaidan hadn't seen her engaged in any form of casual interaction. This side of her, the finality of her refusal to obey, as if a dam had been ruptured, all this was apparently new to everyone, especially her superiors.

"The Alliance has intel services on the Citadel, of course. But so does the Council, and as much as I hate to admit it, they're better. We don't know how 'secret' our secret services truly are here, so I can't have them actively look for information, this is too delicate. Arterius is very influential and I'm sure quite a few people have his interests at heart, and will do whatever it takes to stall our agents as they soon as they come into contact with information dealers. We have to keep it low-key, even if that means using more mundane channels. There are eyes on you already, Shepard, no doubt, but as long as you keep your search legal, there's not much they can do. You know the situation, you can handle yourself, so it might as well be you."

"Unless you can point me in the right direction, I don't even know where to begin."

"There is one person you could talk to," Udina said. He had obviously not discussed it with Anderson prior to this conversation, because the latter turned his head towards him with a questioning look. "He's a C-Sec agent, as a matter of fact he was one of the first humans to be admitted into the ranks of Citadel Security. He has somewhat loose morals which got him this close to being fired more than once, but we've managed to pull some strings every time. He's proved himself useful to the Alliance on several occasions, giving us heads up and classified information as long as we're willing to pay up. He's not a mole, just a lowlife, he can't be trusted but he usually knows when something big is going on. He might have heard who was charged with the investigation on Arterius, or he might be willing to help us find out. His name is Harkin."

"Harkin?" Anderson echoed. "Ambassador, you haven't heard?"

"Heard what?" Udina snapped dryly.

"Harkin's been fired for good, recently. I don't know the details but I guess he went too far this time, or perhaps the Alliance brass pulled its support now that we have enough humans in C-Sec for it not to reflect badly on us if one gets fired. Anyway, he's not there anymore."

"Shit," Udina sighed, looking up thoughtfully. Shepard crossed her arms, Kaidan could tell she was paying attention.

"There might be another option," Anderson suggested quietly. "Executor Pallin is-"

"Executor Pallin? Are you out of your mind? He makes no secret of his dislike for humans, and even if it wasn't the case, he would never give us any information regarding an ongoing investigation. It could even backfire, given how close he is to the Council."

Anderson raised his hands in a pacifying gesture. "That's true, but I know him. He doesn't like how fast the Alliance is climbing the ladder, but he's not unfair. He is strict, loyal to the Council, but to his principles first. He's strongly opposed to the Spectres' lack of accountability, I actually had a conversation with him years ago about the incident when I was working with Arterius, and he made it clear that he thought Saren was a disgrace to his species and even to the Council. He keeps an open door policy, so I don't think going in to ask him a few questions will do any harm, even though it's unlikely he will help. We have to start somewhere."

_Incident?_ Kaidan wondered. He briefly considered the possibility that it might be the reason why both the Captain and the Ambassador had seemed so quick to associate the dockworker's description with Saren Arterius, so adamant that the Spectre had something to hide. What if Shepard was right and they were just being unreasonably hasty in their accusations? _Are we playing someone else's game by focusing on him? Do we have any other option?_ He was, in a way, glad not to be in his superiors' shoes. Kaidan was aware of his own ability to assess political or strategic situations with a critical eye. He was a good observer and had no difficulty coming to reasoned conclusions, even though sometimes, those conclusions were simply an admission of his own ignorance. But the decision-making itself was not something he liked. Alternatives, particularly when it came to politics or military matters, often presented a choice between two evils, the lesser of which was never easy to determine, and yet, a decision had to be made, and fast. Responsibilities shouldered, consequences lived with.

"We'd be sticking our head in the lion's mouth, talking to Pallin directly like this. Even if he hates the Spectres, it doesn't mean he won't report to the Council to tell them we're prying, hindering his agent's investigation, or something along those lines. They wouldn't be able to do anything against us, but it might influence their decision concerning both Arterius and Shepard's candidacy. On the other hand, doing nothing won't help us either," Udina paused, a deep crease marking his brow. "Fine," he ended up declaring, seemingly to himself, before focusing on Shepard, who hadn't moved an inch. "It's worth the risk, hopefully the mere fact we're not trying to hide our search and that we didn't put some intel group on the case will play in our favor. You'll go see Executor Pallin, Shepard. He should be in his office at this hour," he said after glancing at his omni-tool. "I will also forward Harkin's private number to you as soon as I find out if he kept the one I already have. If Pallin won't budge, try calling him, maybe he's kept a few contacts in C-Sec. Obviously I can't call him myself, I can't afford to be associated with him now that he's been fired. Bribe him if you have to. In cash, of course. He's cheap anyway, doesn't see any further than his next fix."

"You can't hit or threaten him, though. He might be a hopeless drunk but he can be nasty, and you don't want this to come up against you right before the-" Anderson began before Udina interrupted him with an irritated wave of his hand.

"Don't give us that. The man is scum, he sleeps with the whores he arrests, turns a blind eye whenever he can get booze or red sand out of it, and he likes roughing up suspects. That's why he knows so much and was so damn useful to us. Do you seriously think he'll spill the beans just because Shepard threatens to spank him? He's a brute, not a coward. Besides, he knows better than to put a spoke in the Alliance's wheels, we have enough against him to let him rot in jail for ten years. We can afford to knock a teeth or two out of him if he won't cooperate."

At that, Kaidan glanced her way. He remembered the look she'd had when Anderson had told her to fall in line back at the Embassy, and even though she appeared calm and composed, he now had a vague idea just how far she was liable to go. He wondered what Torfan had been like, but mostly he wondered whether she would have blown the Eden Prime dockworker's head off had he refused to talk. Visibly, Anderson was having similar thoughts, because he looked at her intently with an imperceptible move of the head that seemed to say _we both know what you're capable of, and if you cross that line, you'll have me to answer to._

Oblivious to that silent warning, Udina went on. "Anyway, I have a lot to take care of. You'll report to Captain Anderson, he'll pass it on to me if it's important enough. Pallin's office is in the opposite wing of the building, ask the receptionist for directions. Assuming you know the meaning of those words, I would suggest courtesy and diplomacy when dealing with the Executor, for everyone's sake. Is everything clear?"

* * *

_Nihlus leaned forward in his armchair, elbows resting on his knees, his joined hands supporting the weight of his head. He finally had a moment to study the contents of the OSD that had been lying in the glove compartment of his speeder for two weeks. The disc contained copies of some old footage he had graciously been given access to by the Systems Alliance military brass. A month before, humans had won a decisive victory on a small moon known for being a batarian stronghold. The attack had been launched in retaliation to the Skyllian Blitz, an unexpected – and failed – batarian assault on Elysium in 2176. The Skyllian Blitz itself was, from a certain standpoint, already a form of retribution caused by colonial disputes between the two races, but Nihlus wasn't presently interested in the political or geostrategic implications of those successive attacks. The recent battle that had taken place on that small moon, Torfan, had not been won because the humans were fine strategists, or because they had superior firepower. In fact, they had only escaped a scathing defeat by the width of a hair. They had underestimated their enemies' weaponry, and had failed to take the terrain into account. It hadn't been an open battle, but dozens of bloody skirmishes in the narrow maze of an underground complex. The advantage the humans had counted on, superior numbers, had been annulled. No, it was the actions of a single soldier that had led them to victory. And Nihlus intended to gather as much information as he could about this young human in order to determine whether she was Spectre material._

_The Alliance had its heroes. Every race had its heroes. But 'heroes' was not what the Special Tactics and Reconnaissance branch of the Citadel was eager to recruit. No matter what the human press coverage had said about this young woman, she had sent three quarters of her unit to their deaths in the labyrinthine corridors so that she could advance to the heart of the complex, against all odds, and deprive the enemy of its leaders. But she hadn't stopped there, wiping out the surrendering forces methodically. It hadn't been pretty, but it was a form of self-reliance Spectres knew all too well, and the Council had immediately given Nihlus the right to evaluate her potential candidacy. He had observed the human press coverage from a distance and searched the legally available material he could gather about her, and when that was done, he had contacted one of her commanding officers, whom he happened to know, and told the Alliance of the Council's interest into their new champion. As far as Nihlus could tell, the humans had been eager to cooperate and had opened Shepard's record for him, as well as all related material. The perspective of a human Spectre was certainly something they viewed as both an honor and a sign of advancement and elevation into the galactic community. Of course, should one of them ever become a Spectre, they would soon understand that Special Tactics wasn't a place for decorum, pride or shining deeds that reflected on a race as a whole. No matter what the political discourse was, a Spectre was never chosen depending on their race's loyalty to the Council, which was partly why, although a fair number of candidates was considered each month, almost none of them were deemed independent enough to be entrusted with legal immunity, unaccountable freedom, bound only by an oath to "be their own judge and serve the galactic community through the Council, or despite the Council." Spectres were an essential loophole, a contradiction. Few sentient beings had the strength to live with this._

_Having been away from the Citadel for two weeks, he hadn't had the chance to study Shepard's record. The human public opinion, although supportive of the Alliance military's actions to end the batarian threat once and for all, had expressed concerns about Shepard's ruthless efficiency. Her superiors, however, had underlined her reliability, sense of sacrifice and ability to get the job done under dire circumstances. How much of it was true was another matter, it was communication after all, and the subject was less important than the light shed upon it. These considerations had been expressed in a few interviews, a couple of them featuring Shepard herself. She was never the one to talk, though, always a superior accompanying her. Understandable. Nihlus wouldn't pretend he was particularly insightful when it came to decode another species' body language, but the fact a human's face looked very much like an asari's made it easier to interpret, their expressions disturbingly familiar. Shepard didn't look like she had anything to express at all during those interviews. He could tell she had a nice silhouette and beautiful features by asari standards, and he himself didn't find her unpleasant to look at, so she must be considered pretty among her people. As for her hair, he thought nothing of it. It seemed unusually long for a soldier, but whatever humans did with their hair was still a mystery to him. It seemed a very prominent part of the image they wished to convey to one another and to themselves. All this hair came in a wide variety of textures and colors, not all of them natural, and although Nihlus had grown used to it all – he was a Citadel dweller, human hair was far from the strangest thing one could encounter while wandering around the station –, he still had difficulty figuring out the meaning of this or that particular hairstyle, the impressions it was meant to cause or what it revealed about a person. He remembered the first time he had found himself taking a Citadel elevator with a human woman who happened to have long, wavy hair. She was shorter than him, so his view of her head was pretty good and he had felt a childish urge to touch this abundant, glistening mane. Hadn't done it, of course._

_These thoughts passed through his mind as his holo-player swallowed the OSD. The screen flickered to life. Indications appeared against the dark background, written in the standard human alphabet, which Nihlus could recognize but not comprehend, and then in common Galactic: _Dec. 2173 – Fort Charles Upham (Titan) – Group LV-426 supervised by DI Ellison_. Nihlus had been told the Systems Alliance recorded every major drill that took place during their training programs, and he knew that the footage he was about to watch was one of the earliest traces of Shepard's military existence._

_A dozen of young humans of both genders were aligned, in light training gear, in some indoor facility. They were being lectured by an older man Nihlus assumed was the aforementioned drill instructor, Ellison. He couldn't understand what was being said but chose not to activate his sub-dermal translator. He would do it later. For the time being, he wanted to observe without distraction. He looked at each recruit while Ellison was barking his instructions, and finally spotted Shepard. He hesitated for a few seconds, because naturally she looked much younger, and her hair was cut shorter than it presently was. Not as short as the males' – what was the term? Buzzing cut? Something like that – but barely long enough to cover her ears. She didn't stand out in any way, not that there was much room for originality during exercises. Ellison seemed to be reviewing each trainee individually, and didn't sound pleased with any of them. He stopped in front of Shepard, hollered something to which she replied with what sounded like the standard answer, and Ellison moved on to roar at the next one. _

_When he was done with the last of them, he stepped out of the screen and yelled one word, paused, another word, paused again, and at the third word all the trainees bolted forward in unison. He had been counting down. The view switched to another camera to follow the runners in what appeared to be a standard assault course. Nihlus lost Shepard in the compact group as they all climbed over a high wall and jumped to the other side, but already gaps were beginning to appear between the trainees as they reached the second obstacle, some sort of net. He caught Shepard by a flash of fair hair. She was in the leading pack, not the fastest, but Nihlus was only able to look at her for a second before they all ducked underneath the net, in what turned out to be a large pool of mud. They soon crawled out of the camera's field, which was filled with the next batch of recruits. They ducked, and the view switched again to the first three runners. It took Nihlus a moment to discern which, among the mud-covered trainees, was Shepard. There was a bit of free running before the next obstacle, and she unexpectedly dashed past the others, snatching the first place. Another girl seemed to take offense and accelerated as well, the others keeping their steadfast rhythm, probably to save their energy. The camera focused on the silent duel between Shepard and the girl, who was in fact a short boy – they all looked the same. They jumped over a hurdle, Shepard first, and resumed running practically side by side. They were both dashing as fast as they could, not conserving energy, perhaps counting on their large advantage to make up for the soon-to-come exhaustion that would allow the others to catch up. Nihlus felt a smile creeping up when, after a couple of hurdles, three other runners caught up with them and ran past in a matter of seconds. The camera switched to the last trainees that were now jumping over the first hurdle, then to the new leading pack, then back to Shepard and the boy. They both looked ready to spit their lungs out, and suddenly there was another, higher wall standing in front of them. They jumped, lurched upwards and dragged themselves over it. Shepard was faster but she fell head first on the ground, and Nihlus, winced for her. She got up awkwardly, stumbling like a drunkard, and was already running when the boy landed behind her, much more smoothly. _

_The outcome of the assault course remained a mystery, but Nihlus caught one last image of Shepard before the camera flickered once more to the slower runners, the screen going dark abruptly after this. She was wiping some mud off her face as she jogged over a precarious wood plank, and shot a glance at the camera. Nihlus rewound and paused, Shepard's eyes fixed upon him, not seeing him. He looked at those eyes for a moment, those cloudy eyes, that screamed of youth and something else. Perhaps nothing special._

* * *

"I'm here to talk to the Executor, is he available?" Shepard asked the VI.

"The Executor is currently in his office, I will ask him if he can receive you. Under what name shall I introduce you?"

"Shepard, Alliance Navy." Every time her lips formed her own name, a particular memory licked her mind like a retreating wave. What was a name, what did it say, didn't say? She could still feel the weight of that pen as she wrote it down for the first time.

_She heard the glass doors slide shut behind her as she exited the applications office, a green five-sheet form under her arm identifying her as one of the soldier wannabes roaming the building. Upon seeing a small group of people waiting for the elevator, she pushed the heavy emergency exit door instead. The stairwell was cool and slightly damp, contrasting with the stuffy atmosphere of the rest of the place. She lingered, slowly making her way down to the first floor. She stepped into the lobby but, instead of leaving as she had initially planned, she forked off towards the reception desk and asked the woman sitting on the other side if she could borrow a pen. "There's one on your right," the receptionist deadpanned, not looking up from whatever she was typing. There was indeed a pen, but it was chained to the desk, the kind of pen visitors used for a quick signature or to write down directions, not to fill out an entire application form. No choice, no privacy. She placed the sheets on the narrow board and unclipped the pen from its base, then tried to find a comfortable position. The desk was rather high._

_She shifted the pen from her right hand to her left one and back – she was ambidextrous, but the short chain was making it hard to hold it steadily in either hand. She knew some of the selected applications underwent a graphoanalysis, and although she was aware the results didn't depend on the prettiness of the handwriting, surely a discreet effort to achieve clarity wouldn't be seen as a flaw? What did it depend on anyway, the sharpness of a 'w', the roundness of an 'o', a healthy balance of curves and peaks to testify for a sane, strong mind? Would an overly large handwriting be seen as messy exuberance, a bloated ego, or could it, through certain subtle and almost esoteric clues, reveal confidence, a disposition for leadership? Oh, she knew there was no way to consciously come up with the right handwriting. But the problem was, she couldn't just try and make it flow as naturally as possible, because it had never come to her. A personal, inevitable handwriting, a mark of her own. Even when she wrote in a hurry, when she wasn't thinking about the form of the letters or the direction towards which they would lean, the results seemed different every time. She would force her hand to get used to a certain way of tracing this or that letter, and the habit would stick for a time, soon discarded, replaced._

_Seconds passed, and she hadn't even decided which hand she would use when an elegant, slender fountain pen was presented to her. Her eyes went from pen to hand, up the arm, straight to the receptionist's face. The woman gave her a fixed smile that disappeared almost instantly, but deep within her eyes, there was something gentle. A great many things felt gentle lately, so perhaps she was imagining it. Funny how most adults seemed to expect her to be on edge, scarred by years in the streets and ready to bite for her share of happiness, protected by a psychological shell that wanted nothing more than to crack and spill its sorrows if kindness was shown. But no, she didn't feel on edge, or dissociated, shielded by an armor pieced together out of hardship. There was no hardship. She was young, listless and with little to prove. A lingering softness caressing everything. She thanked the receptionist. "Be careful with it. You can seat over there and use one of the low tables, if you want," the woman replied, whose eyes and attention were again focused on her work._

_There she went, as far as possible from the constant comings and goings of people walking in and out of the building. She took a seat and used one of the outdated, dog-eared magazines available to wipe the plastic surface of the table in front of her. As she placed the blank form down once more, her eyes fell on one of the dotted lines that required filling: __**Name and Surname**__. She had a name, of course. Given to her when she was still a baby, because a person needs a name and that's that. But this name had never been registered in any sort of official records, it was just a first name made hers by use, not by law. As far as the army was concerned, this lack of legal existence wasn't a problem because it entailed that she had never been arrested, since any previous dealings with the law would have automatically triggered the creation of a record. A retinal scan or DNA test would probably be performed if her application was retained, and it would reveal nothing. 'Nothing' was good enough for the Systems Alliance military. They would then provide her with an identity, using whatever name she had written down on this form. _

_A family name, the one thing you weren't supposed to choose, the one thing that stuck, and she had to invent it. So what, to pick something at random because it had a nice ring to it or, on the contrary, to place herself in the continuity of a spiritual lineage of her choosing? She was aware of all this at an intellectual level, not an emotional one. There was nothing pushing her, no sound that echoed within her, no memory, no fantasy beckoning her to form a secret bound with it. She breathed out slowly and grabbed a magazine. It was an old issue of some Alliance-approved scientific review for the general public, with a focus on space-related discoveries. The cover promised revolutionary findings regarding the properties of black holes, and she let her eyes wander up and down the columns, waiting for a name or word to catch her attention. In the end, it was a picture that did. A photograph of a centuries-old spacesuit, back when humanity was stumbling beyond Earth and sending dogs to die in orbit. It had obviously seen a lot of use, there was something awkward about it, a crude attempt at shielding the body from something foreign, lethal. Nothing like nowadays' environmental suits, as thin as skin and espousing its every pore. And yet, she supposed she would feel safer drifting in the dark tucked in this old, thick thing, rather than feeling all but naked, her body five millimeters away from death. She read the related article, a summary of the events leading to man's first historical steps on the moon. Gagarin, Armstrong, those names could be spotted here and there, several times. Too famous, besides, she felt no connection to them. But she did feel something when it came to space. It wasn't curiosity, or a yearning for something different, a more exciting life, the calling of the explorer. She didn't know what it was. A stir to see it. To wander through a busy station, a place of arrivals and departures, of transition, where everyone was going somewhere but nobody had arrived yet. _

_She stared hard at the old spacesuit on the picture. She would have loved to touch it, to try it on. There was something endearing about it, stories untold. She leaned closer to the tiny photograph to try and make out the details. A name tag was sewn right under the collar. It read 'Shepard'._

"The Executor will receive you now, Commander," said the VI, gesturing towards a wide, closed door on the right side of the waiting room.

Shepard turned to Alenko and Williams, who were ready to follow her into the Executor's office. They were both ready to follow her orders as long as they sounded reasonable, as long as they could keep her in sight. She looked at them and all she could see was their uniform, their weapons, their military bearing. Imperceptibly, she bent her fingers, clutching the edge of her sleeve. "I'm going in alone," she declared. She saw them exchange a glance, but they didn't object. Going around the VI's pedestal, she stood before the large door to the Executor's office for a second. It opened with a discreet hiss of pressurized air. Facing her directly across the spacious room was a turian sitting at his desk, his eyes on her, very still. She had barely taken a step forward when she heard the door swish back into place.

"Commander Shepard," the turian stated slowly, a hint of amusement in his voice, which sounded deeper than what she remembered of Kryik's. His facial markings were light blue, covering most of his upper face.

"Executor," she replied with a nod, taking a few steps towards his desk but remaining at a distance. Holo screens were flickering, and there was a glass of something by his side. Her throat tightened violently and for a brief moment, she couldn't move. He wasn't the first one she saw, but… _He is not human_. _He's not human. He's- _He gestured towards the two chairs in front on him. She took a seat and let her eyes settle on him. She had never been one of those insolent starers, and she was aware that people saw something absent-minded in the way she looked at them, even when she was fully there.

"What could you possibly want from me?" he ended up asking. "Or are you here on behalf of Ambassador Udina?"

She took a deep, silent breath. "It was Captain Anderson who suggested that I come see you. They want me to find out about your investigation into Saren Arterius' activities."

"I beg your pardon?" Venari Pallin said with a disbelieving chuckle.

"They don't believe you'll be willing to say anything on the matter. And they don't believe your agent will be successful in so short a time. But they thought an open visit would be proof enough that they're not trying to impede your investigation."

"My my, Commander, such blatant honesty," the Executor remarked. "Is that part of the plan as well? To come to me so openly I will marvel at such integrity and tell you whatever you want to know?"

"No, Executor," she said evenly. _It's just that lying takes too much_. "To come to you openly would be telling you that there is no plan, that there are two Alliance soldiers in the waiting room reporting my every move to Captain Anderson, that I have no idea who Saren Arterius is and no reason to think he's involved. It would be telling you that I only agreed to be sent on this fool's errand because of the infinitesimal chance I will find something to tip the scales. Anything. You probably know I'm being considered for a position in Special Tactics and Reconnaissance," Pallin opened his mouth but she was quicker. "We both know your agent is unlikely to find out anything solid in two days. Arterius will be cleared whether he's guilty or innocent, my candidacy will be rejected or put on hold, I will be court-martialed by the Alliance military, and I'll leave the army. I have to try. I see no reason why you would share classified information with me, but I've got to try."

Pallin's mandibles swayed. "And once again, humans demonstrate they impatience and inability to learn their place. When they're not given what they think they're entitled to, they seek to intervene, to 'tip the scales', as you said. You have advanced further and faster than most races, you already have a very real place within the galactic community, and still this is not enough. Your Ambassador thinks that the only way for this investigation to yield results is for a human to take part in it. And he sends you. Tell me, Commander, what difference do you hope to make, what improvement do you think you can bring to C-Sec's methods?" he said, all amusement gone from his voice.

Shepard looked above his shoulder and beyond his office. She could hear a fountain nearby. The absurdity of the situation wasn't lost on her. She felt she had neither the strength to convince nor the subtlety to persuade. She wasn't part of those who were one step ahead, leading while appearing to follow. Her heart was pounding, her hands sweaty. "I'm not here on behalf of anyone, and I have no interest in discussing your political views on humanity's immaturity," she said. "If a few months from now, I find myself tried and demoted, doing grunt work in a backwater colony because I'm not qualified for anything else, maybe I'll be glad. Or maybe I'll be eaten up by the fact I didn't do all I could to find something else, or that what I did, I could have done better and differently. I'll keep searching until the hearing takes place, with or without your help."

Pallin let out a discreet chuckle and shook his head. "Far be it from me to rob you of your bright and beautiful future in Special Tactics, Commander, but as you may have heard, I'm not one to bend the rules to attain my objectives. I've had to deal with the most lawless scum you can imagine, and not once have I needed to break the law, even for the sake of helping the truth come to light. Not once. I can't condone the Spectres' impunity. Rules may be a hindrance, and you may find me rigid for clinging to them, but until we can all live in good intelligence with one another, those rules are your saving grace whether you're aware of it or not. It may be easier, faster to get the job done when there are no legal boundaries to worry about, but at what cost? The Council chooses its Spectres with great care, and most of the time, there's never even a ripple in the water. But what happens when something does go wrong, when a single agent decides to use this impunity to further their own agenda? When that happens, we're left in the dark, you said it yourself, it's almost impossible to dig up a Spectre's dirty business. So what makes you think I would do anything to help your candidacy? What little I know of you is in contradiction with many of my principles." What _little _could he know of her? Torfan, Eden Prime. Setting those two episodes aside, she was no one. Hadn't done anything. After a pause, he spoke again. "Besides, I don't know what happened to make you fall from your own people's good graces, but you can't seriously believe that I would look favorably upon a personal request. I find individualism to be… inelegant."

Shepard got up, causing Pallin's mandibles to twitch. "So are your assumptions. The Council knows more than you do about my motivations. For what it's worth, I agree with your principles, but they may not outweigh the question that will remain after the hearing. You will never know whether Arterius was guilty. And perhaps you'll wonder what you could have done differently."

"When you've been on the job for as long as I have, things tend to get very grey. Laws, as obtuse and perfectible as they are, are the only common ground by which we can try to make everyone cohabitate," Pallin said, his voice so deep it echoed through her ribcage. "Whether I find comfort in my principles is hardly relevant. Anyone who makes a living out of enforcing the law should be ready to spend sleepless nights questioning their decisions and the beliefs that supported them. These sleepless nights, however, must be kept separate from the decisions of the day. Call it a necessary sacrifice."

"A necessary sacrifice?" Shepard repeated, frowning. "Does the well-being of the many justify a single one of your sleepless nights? The many is a blurry thing, and what you call sacrifice is a form of compromise not so different from bending the rules occasionally. Nothing is set in stone, we all compromise. It's a grey world, you said it."

"But sleepless nights are part of the future you're preparing yourself for, should you get into Special Tactics. Worse than sleepless nights, in fact. Spectres _embody_ sacrifice, Shepard."

"Spectres are not a symbol, Executor, or a statement. Our societies are anchored, kept together by rules. But Spectres have the luxury to assess each situation regardless of laws that, as essential as they are, sometimes don't have the ability to respond to what we occasionally have to face.

"So you think C-Sec or the military, or any similar law-enforcing organization should operate on a case-to-case basis, or at the very least make exceptions when necessity calls? Ideally, yes. But no society has the means, or the integrity, for that."

"Spectres are not part of society. They're few, disconnected from one another, barely an organization. They're the risk we can't afford to take on a larger scale." She paused for a shaky intake of breath. "Thank you for your time, Executor." She walked away, heart hammering at her chest.

"Commander," Pallin called. She stopped, closed her eyes for a fraction of a second and turned to face him across the room. "I'm surprised to see you out and about so soon, given what that Prothean artifact subjected you to, if the reports I read are accurate." She remained silent. For a moment, he seemed absorbed in what his holo screen was displaying. "I know you're unfamiliar with the Citadel. Should you seek medical attention, I can only recommend a small clinic in the Wards. Run by a human doctor, I might add. Chloe Michel, you shouldn't have any difficulty finding the address." He raised his head and looked at her, unmoving.

"Chloe Michel," she nodded slowly. They stared at each other for a while before she turned away once more. She stepped into the waiting room, the door hissed behind her, and the tenuous lapping of the fountain she had heard from Venari Pallin's office came to an abrupt end.

* * *

A speeder came to a smooth halt by the waist-high taxi terminal Shepard had used. It was different from the one that had stopped for the previous users, narrower, its cold, metallic surface shimmering. The side door slid open to reveal a dark interior, barely lit by the dim glow from the control panel surrounding the single seat. A glance at the terminal told her that her_ vehicle had arrived, please take a seat. Thank you for using the Citadel Public Transit System, we wish you a pleasant journey and hope to see you again soon_. She was about to get inside when the Lieutenant stepped forward behind her.

"Commander, we're supposed to help you to the best of our ability and inform Captain Anderson of our progress. We can't do that if you don't tell us anything and insist on travelling alone. We're not here to hinder you, but with all due respect, we have our orders and you know it."

"Your orders, your problem," she retorted while slipping inside the speeder.

"Commander," Alenko said more firmly, putting a hand on the door and leaning over slightly. "Please, don't make this more complicated than it has to be."

For security reasons, the door wouldn't slide back into place as long as something was in the way. Shepard ran a hand over her eyes, which were tingling with exhaustion. She looked up. His face was open, a calm frown creasing his brow. Williams placed herself behind him. Now that she was seated, Shepard noticed the big bulge between the Lieutenant's legs, his armor emphasizing it obscenely, so close to her face. "All you will do is shove your military get-up into the face of everyone I talk to. How does that help? The only reason I'm not expressly demanding that you get out of my way is precisely because I know you have your orders. If you can keep up, fair enough, but if not, deal with it. Now, remove your hand from that door," she said before releasing the silent sigh that had been weighing her down for a while.

Alenko remained still for a few seconds, then did as she asked. _As you wish_, his expression seemed to say, as if he'd tried his best to prevent her from committing a mistake, but wasn't about to shed tears over her sealing her fate. He looked at her until she closed the door. A wave of relief washed over her when she found herself alone in the comfort of the tiny passenger cell. Exterior noises were muffled, she could smell the fabric of her seat, and the opaque windshield filtered the light from the outside to a restful haze. She swiped her omni-tool in front of the reader, and the main display informed her that she did not possess a subscription and that the fare would therefore be debited from her personal account. She gave her authorization, entered her destination and selected the autopilot. She fastened the thin belt and leaned back, resisting the urge to close her eyes.

The speeder rose slowly. Once it towered above the Presidium's neighbouring buildings, it turned and seamlessly slipped into the traffic flow, instantly gaining speed. Shepard looked at the stream running parallel to the vehicle's course, shivering between the inner and outer rings of the Presidium. Trees, slender bridges, terraces, fountains, all of this immobile elegance was suddenly above her, and for a disorientating handful of seconds, she gazed at the water through the speeder's roof and felt about to fall onto the transparent pane, before her body told her that gravity has simply shifted when the vehicle had left the central ring of the Presidium to enter one of the five wards that extended from it. Night engulfed the speeder, and the bright, artificial light of day was replaced with the glow of a myriad of multicolored signs, traffic lights, lit windows, all mirrored in the surface of sleek skyscrapers, looming, blurred by speed and sound, the unmistakable breathing of a metropolis. Shepard recognized the feeling, the underlying whispers swallowed among the nameless, every person their own center in this urban indifference. A pang of envy, thinking of them all, working, living here. She frowned these thoughts away as her hand found something to hold on to.

* * *

oOo

* * *

"Yeah, we have her. But there's a slight problem, boss." Yamani paused. No answer came, only light static and the deep breathing of his interlocutor. This wasn't good. Yamani bit back a sigh, shot a glance at his geths, all of them perfectly still, and took a few steps towards the abandoned research camp at the far end of the cave. These synthetics were efficient, obedient, but damn did they lack basic social skills. Or maybe they just didn't care enough to use them. "These ruins are made up of some sort of cells, like-"

"_I know what they look like, get to the point_," Arterius snarled in his low, grating voice.

It took more than an angry turian to fray a krogan's nerves. But this one was no ordinary turian, he was a Spectre, and the nasty sort. Yamani stayed because of the pay, but he was beginning to feel like he'd been caught in a web that seemed to expand further and further over time. Not that he gave a shit about his boss' motives, but he never intended to be trapped in this job where failure was not an option. After that one, maybe he should just take his money and get out of that contract while he still could. If he still could. What a mess.

"When we got there, the doctor was in one of those cells, and before we could get a hold of her she managed to trigger some security field that sealed her away from us."

"_Imbecile! I told you she knew those ruins better than you and would slip though your fingers if you gave her the chance_."

"With all due respect, boss, we did what we had to do. The only way to get to her was to use this old, creaky elevator, she must have heard us come down. As you thought, she wasn't armed, but her biotics kick a hell of a punch and even your synthetics were knocked out. It gave her the time she needed to fumble with that control panel. For what it's worth, I don't think she knew what she was doing because on top of triggering the barrier that's preventing us from entering the cell, she managed to trap herself into a secondary field. She can't move. But we can't get to her, even rockets won't get past that field."

"_Of course they won't, it's a Prothean confinement mechanism you're dealing with. How long has it been?"_

"Hours. We've tried everything, from sweet talking her, to digging our way through that rock with grenades. Nothing worked."

"_Listen very carefully. If you must stay down that hole until she starves to death, you will. She's not getting out of there alive unless she's in your custody, and neither are you if I don't get what I paid you for. So you're going to keep trying. Whatever it takes. Understood?"_

"Understood, boss," Yamani growled, eyeing the blue security field shimmering on the other side of the cave. He could make out the silhouette of the asari, trapped in there, limbs spread out as if chained in that position by invisible shackles.

"_Make sure she isn't withholding information from you. She may have an idea how to deactivate the barrier_."

"I've asked her, told her she'd rot in that cell if we couldn't find a way to get her out. She just closed her eyes. It's hard to tell what's going on, she's stuck in such an awkward position, but she either fainted, or she's praying. Or meditating, whatever it is asari do."

"_Tell her where the synthetics comes from. Tell her I'm interested in her area of expertise, and that the one who led me to her was a Matriarch with her best interests at heart, who is with me willingly even as we speak, and who urges her 'Little Wing' to be reasonable."_

"A Matriarch?" Yamani sniggered.

"_Her mother_."

* * *

oOo

* * *

A C-Sec agent was posted outside the clinic, and for a moment, Kaidan thought it might be the detective in charge of investigating Saren Arterius' whereabouts, but there was something a bit too static in the salarian's bearing for him to be actively searching. He looked like he was guarding the place. Again, Kaidan wondered what had transpired in Venari Pallin's office. All he knew was that Shepard had looked up this clinic as soon as she was done with the Executor, and had then taken a speeder. She was a few minutes ahead of them. He hoped she was still in there, provided that she had actually gone in at all. He wiped his brow, but the skin was dry.

"It's just a small clinic, it shouldn't be guarded like that. Maybe Shepard found something. That, or she assaulted the place and this guy had to restrain her," Williams said in a low voice, glancing at the C-Sec agent.

Kaidan smiled, too preoccupied to be genuinely amused. "She's not easy, I'll give you that. She seems to get it done, though. I don't know." He was trying to decide how best to approach the situation. Go in, or talk to the agent?

"I wasn't- Sorry, I was out of place," Williams said with a reluctant frown, and Kaidan shot her a surprised look. Tethering on the verge of familiarity, only to withdraw as if she didn't know whether she had crossed a line.

"It's okay, Chief. I'm not going to blame you for having an opinion. Neither is Captain Anderson, for that matter. The Normandy's crew seems to be as much of a prototype as the ship herself, look at the way he had you transferred. It's not standard procedure. As long as you do your job right and stick to basic protocol I don't think the Captain would mind a bit of free thinking. Just don't do it when she's around," he added as an afterthought.

She let out a small chuckle. She smiled easily, generously. "I'll try to remember that. Most of the people I've served under were pretty uptight, I think I need some time to adapt to the way things work on the Normandy. You all seem pretty relaxed, I mean I heard your navigator strike a comm. link conversation about his back problems with someone down in engineering, and half your helmsman's jokes would normally earn him a captain's mast… not to mention his beard. And then, on the other hand, you have the Commander, who's about to be court-martialed for insubordination," she replied with a helpless shrug.

"Unconventional ship, unconventional crew," Kaidan concluded as he walked towards the entrance. The salarian guard didn't step aside.

"Weapons are unauthorized beyond this point, sir."

Kaidan glanced at Ashley. "We're Alliance military, I thought we were allowed to carry a weapon while on duty."

"You are, otherwise you wouldn't have made it here," the salarian explained quickly. He spoke much faster than the Councilor. "But this clinic has been placed under Citadel Security protection for the time being. Rules are different, no weapons allowed."

"You can give me your weapon, LT, I'll wait here while you go in," Williams offered.

"Thank you, but I don't think that'll work, you'd be carrying two weapons."

"True," she muttered, her voice betraying her frustration. "We can't turn back now, though, Shepard might not be there anymore if we come back later. And there's definitely something going on."

Kaidan turned his attention to the salarian again. "Could we leave our weapons with you, then? I'm aware it may not be how you usually proceed but we're on urgent business under the human ambassador's command, we won't be long," he explained in his best diplomatic voice. He thought of Shepard in her civilian clothing, no gun, who must have gone in without a hitch. She was right, there was no playing detective in a soldier's armor. She seemed to be making decisions on the spur of the moment, sharp one second, aloof and scattered the next, then driven to a fault. Perhaps she knew, somehow, what she was doing. Kaidan felt a small pang of spite at being excluded from her reasoning. It would have gone so much better had she bothered to share her findings, her plan, whatever she had. He and Williams would have followed. But she was vague, she said nothing, leaving them to their own devices, opening her mouth only when pressed relentlessly. And even then, as she spoke to them, she was already looking elsewhere.

"I'm sorry," the salarian said in his fast, laconic tone. "I can't do that, I'd be held responsible for any damage those weapons might cause in your absence."

"Look, our superior officer is in there. Young woman, blond hair, dark clothes?" Williams intervened before Kaidan could stop her. She was definitely on the blunt side when it came to social interaction. She surprised him when she spoke again after a curt nod from the salarian confirmed Shepard's presence in the clinic. "We understand you're doing your job, but so are we. What if we unloaded our weapons, could you look after them for a few minutes?"

The guard's reptilian features were unreadable, and he remained silent for a handful of seconds. "…Sorry, I can't. Just call your superior officer and let her know you're outside, I'm sure she'll come out. Or if that's the doctor you want to talk to, I could call her for you, if you like."

Williams raised her eyebrows in Kaidan's direction. He nodded. "All right," she said. "If you could call the doctor out, we'd appreciate it."

* * *

The salarian activated the mechanism manually, closing the clinic's door behind them, and the hum of the Wards was dulled to a distant murmur. Ashley took a deep breath, expecting the sterile, sweet and vaguely sickening smell of all medical facilities, but the only scent that drifted past her nostrils was that of… eucalyptus? She looked around. The room was large, but the low ceiling, as well as the surprisingly dim lighting, suggested a restful, bare intimacy. Ashley's eyes came to rest on the doctor's back as the woman, Chloe Michel, according to her name tag, led them through the waiting room to the consulting ward proper. She looked to be in her thirties and wore a long, red and white turtleneck tunic. Ashley had seen quite a few of those on the Presidium, as if it were some kind of commonly accepted work outfit, somewhere between elegant and functional. She briefly imagined herself in one. Dark, stylish. Her hair artistically tangled around a lacquered chopstick… a lawyer perhaps, fierce, power-hungry, wielding words better than guns. Getting out of the office at the end of the day, surrounded by young and successful colleagues, laughing, busy, and they would all go to some sleek Citadel lounge to sip overpriced alien drinks, and she wouldn't be the one to hide a sad bottle under her bunk to celebrate Armistice Day by herself, she wouldn't be carrying her grandfather's shame in her record, and once in a while she would surprise her sister by picking her up from school. _What a joke_. She looked at her gloved hands, her heavy armor's thick padding.

"I'm surprised they let you in so easily," the doctor said, glancing at them over her shoulder. After going back inside to check with the Commander, she had returned to tell the salarian that they were indeed Shepard's subordinates and could be let in. It had then taken an ID check, a couple of calls from the guard, and C-Sec clearance had been granted to them, weapons and all. Either Citadel Security was, in fact, much less inclined to stonewall those – humans in particular – who thought to bend the rules, than Ashley had imagined after hearing Udina and Anderson talk about the Executor, or it had something to do with Shepard's investigation. It was unsettling, not knowing what the woman hoped to find in that clinic, or why the place was under C-Sec protection.

The first thing Ashley saw when the glass panes parted to reveal the other side of the small clinic, was the wide opening running along the opposite wall, the faint glow of the distant traffic flow and the dark, cold lights from the Wards seeping through the foliage that shivered right outside the window. All the rooms Ashley had been in on the Citadel so far had featured this blurred boundary between in and out, even though she assumed there was a protective kinetic field or some such defense. The view, combined with the houseplants and potted shrubs that seemed to suffuse the clinic with herbal scents, gave one the impression that nature, unconcerned with what was mostly a mental divide, was what connected public and private spaces. Ashley wouldn't have minded being a patient here, just resting on one of the low beds that lined up the open wall, for a couple of hours. That's when she noticed Shepard, leaning against the windowsill, her back on them but her head turned in their direction, her chin resting on her palm. Their eyes met and Ashley felt the sudden need to give herself a countenance by raising her eyebrows slightly, not knowing what she meant by that. Shepard's face betrayed no annoyance, no irony, only displaying a tired intensity. The hoodie she wore made her appear even thinner than she was. Ashley had often noticed how graceful people managed to make anything look good on them, and how grace had little to do with delicate gestures, or elegance, but appeared to stem from some underlying languor, from the impression that even in stillness, there was a flowing, elusive movement.

The doctor was looking at the three of them alternatively, but nobody was speaking. It was beyond awkward. "Please continue, doctor," Shepard ended up saying, straightening up slowly. Ashley saw Chloe Michel hesitate. The woman sat on the nearest bed after a while, and from the slight creases of the blanket and the water bottle on the bedside table, Ashley guessed that she was probably sitting there before they arrived. There were no patients in the clinic, but the doctor looked exhausted. There was a certain nonchalance about her, as if to indicate that yes, she ran this place, but only among other, more interesting activities. She spoke with an accent, French perhaps, although it was hard to tell. Colony slangs, a tinge of alien vocabulary… it all contributed to breaking down recognizable accents into dozens of variants. Ashley was frequently at a loss when talking to her youngest sister, who colored her words with exotic expressions that came and went.

"The agent came here a few hours ago. He had a warrant giving him access to my latest patients' records. I can't open them for you, they're confidential," the doctor said quickly, raising her hands as if to prevent someone from even asking. "The only thing I can tell you is that after he'd found what he was after, he asked me a few questions and said he'd place the clinic under C-Sec protection."

Shepard was biting her lower lip absent-mindedly, eyes downcast. The bluish glow from the outside lined the left side of her face, her hair, the curve of her neck. "He placed the clinic under protection because of what you told him," she said slowly, and it was impossible to tell whether she was insinuating something or simply asking.

The doctor shook her head with a discreet sigh, closing her eyes for a second. "Look, you're not here in any official capacity, I don't have to tell you anything. I know you're Alliance military, and I'd help if I could, but we're under Citadel jurisdiction here, and I don't think I can give that kind of information to anyone."

Shepard sat on the opposite bunk, facing her. The doctor was following her movements, whether worried or attentive, Ashley couldn't say.

"He must have left you a way to contact him."

"I can't help you," Chloe Michel said calmly, not lowering her gaze under Shepard's unwavering eyes.

"Permission to speak, Commander," Alenko intervened. Shepard looked at him briefly and nodded. "Thank you. Doctor Michel, that C-Sec agent is probably investigating the same case as we are. We're running a parallel investigation, but it has to remain unofficial so as to avoid any conflict with Citadel authorities, that's why the Ambassador can't provide us with a search warrant like your previous visitor. Our findings must be presented to the Council in very little time, and talking to this detective might save us many hours, hours we simply don't have. Perhaps you could call him, ask him if would accept to meet us."

"No," Shepard declared abruptly.

"Why not, Commander?" the Lieutenant asked.

For an instant, Shepard's eyes left Chloe Michel's to address Alenko. "I gave you permission to speak, not permission to reveal anything about my investigation to someone you don't know, in an office which may have been bugged or wiretapped by the very person whose involvement I'm trying to prove. Calling anyone from here is out of the question."

Ashley's stomach tightened, partly because of Shepard's searing reply, delivered so blankly, but also because of its implications. Arterius was a Spectre, he had virtually unlimited resources, contacts everywhere, probably even in C-Sec. She realized that was the reason why what had been said between Shepard and the Executor had led the latter to point her in the right direction. She glanced at Alenko. A barely noticeable sheen of sweat covered his brow. She had no idea what he was thinking, but for once, she was glad she hadn't been the one to speak up.

"Actually," Chloe Michel said, narrowing her eyes at Shepard as if something had passed between them, "that's pretty much what the agent said. That unless it was an emergency, I wasn't to contact him, not from here, not from a public terminal, and that I wasn't to mention his visit to anyone. Obviously, you already knew about that part, so… well, that's why he placed my clinic under C-Sec protection. I'm not even supposed to leave until further notice, for my own safety, he said. I don't know what all this is about, and I don't want to know. You understand why I can't tell you anything, or give you his number."

Silence stretched. "Give me access to the files he looked up. You can always say you thought that as Alliance officials, we had a right to ask for your cooperation. "

"That's not the point. My patients' files are confidential, I already told you. I wouldn't have shown them to this agent if he hadn't had a warrant," the doctor retorted, a hint of exasperation in her voice thickening her accent slightly. Shepard got up without warning and without a noise, startling the doctor, and made her way to the door. "Where are you going?" Chloe Michel asked, getting up as well, and Ashley frowned, detecting something in her tone that hadn't been there so far. Panic. Shepard must have felt it too, because she stopped and turned around, frowning.

"To get a warrant. Which will take hours I don't have," she replied, quoting Alenko. "But I'll get it."

The doctor sighed heavily and ran a hand over her eyes, her shoulders slumped. "Don't," she said in a voice that managed to sound both firm and defeated.

"Get to the point," Shepard let out, and Ashley wondered if this was one of those techniques to get somebody to talk, brutally sneaking into any available opening, not giving them time to collect themselves, or if that was just how Shepard did things. What was she like around those she loved? Did she smile a lot? Was she affectionate? Did she actually have anyone close?

Chloe Michel sat on the bed again and opened her mouth a couple of times before she mustered the strength she needed to speak. "If you get an authorization, there's a risk that… attention will be drawn to some things that I'd rather keep to myself. My license could be revoked, and I'd have to shut the clinic down. It was long ago, nothing serious, but… enough to be trouble," her voice trailed off.

"Did you tell the C-Sec agent?" Shepard asked.

"I didn't see the point, he already had clearance, and it was limited. But nothing is going to stay buried with a warrant coming directly from Alliance secret services, or whatever channel you intend to use. And I know some people wouldn't turn away an opportunity to shut down this place."

There was no threat in Shepard's tone when she spoke. There was nothing at all. "I don't care what you did, it won't leave this room if you let me access those files. It will if you don't. Your choice."

Chloe Michel closed her eyes for a moment. Whatever the woman had done, her current predicament was her own doing, but Ashley had always hated to see that cornered, resigned look on somebody's face. It reminded her of her grandfather.

"Fine," the doctor sighed, getting up. She walked up to her computer. Ashley saw Shepard looking at the doctor's hands, which were shaking slightly as she entered her password. "She's the one he was interested in," she said as a patient's profile popped onscreen, stepping away to let Shepard take her place in front of the computer. The Commander didn't seat, jolting down some notes on a piece of paper with a pen she had asked to borrow from the doctor. She was left-handed, Ashley noticed. But she was practically certain she had seen the woman holding her weapon in her right hand on Eden Prime. Ambidextrous?

"Anything else I should know?" Shepard asked, her voice never losing this gentle, broken quality Ashley has such difficulty reconciling with her intense and colorless gaze.

Chloe Michel gave her a weary nod. "Are you sure you want me to tell you here, in case the place is bugged?"

Shepard turned her head away from what she was reading to look at her. "Your communications are probably being tapped, your office, I don't think so, and I don't want to run the risk of someone following us outside." _Risk for whom?_ Ashley wondered.

"Okay," Chloe Michel said, sitting down once more and running a hand through her red hair, in a gesture reminiscent of Shepard's own habit. "So… this young quarian came, she'd been shot. The wound wasn't too bad, but her immune system- anyway, you read that in the file. I didn't ask what had happened, it wasn't my business. But she wanted to know how to contact the Shadow Broker. The information dealer?" she added after a few seconds, glancing back and forth between the three of them. Ashley offered no reaction, even though she had no idea who the Shadow Broker was. She wasn't about to open her mouth, given Alenko's previous blunder. "She was besides herself when I told her that nobody could reach the Shadow Broker, only his agents. She said she had sensitive information, I guess it had something to do with her getting shot, I don't know. I didn't want to get involved, or cause her trouble by calling C-Sec. But she had nowhere to go, so I gave her a name. A club owner named Fist. He owns Chora's Den, not too far from here." Ashley was fascinated by Shepard's hands, writing all this down. From where she was standing, the notes seemed much cleaner than what she would have expected from the woman. "I think he is, or was, an agent of the Shadow Broker."

"How do you know?" Shepard interrupted.

"Because I needed a loan to open this clinic a few years ago, but the conditions were ridiculous and no bank would grant me one. So when Fist offered his help… I took it. He gave me what I needed. His interest rate is still strangling me to this day," Chloe Michel added with a brief, dejected laugh, "but I knew what I was getting into, it's not like he tried to screw me over. I don't remember when exactly I heard he was rumored to be one of the Broker's agents, but it came up several times and I guess it makes sense, given his… activities. I told the quarian he might be able to help her, but that she'd probably be better off if she went to C-Sec. I'm not sure what she did ultimately. That's all I know," she concluded, a little out of breath. Probably stress, Ashley thought.

Shepard looked at her for a while, then took a few steps forward and handed her the borrowed pen. The doctor took it without a word and Shepard, after giving her a light nod, turned to head for the exit. Ashley exchanged a look with the Lieutenant, who shrugged with a discreet smile and followed the Commander.

"One more thing," Chloe Michel said, causing Shepard to stop and turn around with a surprisingly open look on her face. "What I did, years ago… whatever you decide to do about it, you should know that it really is nothing, at least not worth shutting this place over. All I did was-"

"I don't care, doctor. Goodbye."

* * *

"_You wanted to talk to me, Sha'ira?_

"_I've been notified of the arrival of a rather interesting person on the Citadel. I'd like to meet her. I'll forward you her contact information, please arrange an appointment as soon as possible."_

"_Let me see… Chargé d'affaires Xeltan cancelled his next appointment, two weeks from now. Unless you want me to reschedule someone sooner?"_

"_It would be preferable, I suspect she won't be on the Citadel for long."_

"_I'm afraid I can't reschedule anyone today, they're all here already. Would tomorrow morning be suitable?"_

"_Perfect. And, Nelyna?"_

"_Yes, Sha'ira?"_

"_I want you to handle this personally. Should she refuse, tell her I have something for her."_

* * *

"What are you doing? You're not coming in with me."

"Please, Commander, not that again. Whose orders are we supposed to disobey, yours or Captain Anderson's?" Ashley asked with a sigh that sounded more weary than exasperated.

Shepard stared at her. "Can't you just stop talking? I'm tired of dragging you two around. Do you think you can get into a strip club wearing heavy armor and an assault rifle? And even if you do, did it occur to you that this man might not be inclined to talk to the military? Suit yourself if you want to try to go in, but once you're in there, we don't know each other. And wait at least twenty minutes after I've gone in. Understood?" She saw Williams' cheeks turn red, but the woman nodded.

"Yes, sir," Alenko ended up replying when she raised her eyebrows at him.

She made her way to the bridge leading to the club's entrance. Chora's Den was located in a large and otherwise empty tunnel lit by bright traffic lights guiding the occasional speeder. Music was booming from inside the club, echoing on the concrete walls of the tunnel. Shepard glanced at the bouncer when she got near the door. He was a krogan. He was huge. She swallowed, her heart pounding so hard she had to suppress the urge to put her hand on her chest. Just like in Venari Pallin's office. Her reaction to the shock of otherness was physical, uncontrollable, her mind quieting down quicker than her erratic breathing. It was staring at her with wide-set eyes, and gestured towards the door with a head crowned with a dark crest and dwarfed by a massive, armored hump.

"What the hell are you staring at? Get in or get the fuck out of my sight, human." The aggressive, low rumble of his voice, instead of snapping Shepard out of her daze, only deepened it. Rocks tumbling down the mountainside. He _was_ a fucking mountain. It was beautiful. This other life. She glanced at him one last time as the door slid open, blasting her ears with music.

It felt like stepping into a fish tank. The club was a single, circular room with a high ceiling and a central light well bathing the pole dancers in a crude, bluish glow. They performed on top of the bar, in the middle of the room. Red-lit booths ran along the wall, some big enough to fit a few tables and couches, others obviously designed to welcome private shows for one or two customers. The first thing Shepard smelled was cigarette smoke, which both soothed her and triggered the familiar craving. She reached into her pocket, flicking her pack open, fumbling to extract one cigarette and lighting it with a trembling flame that betrayed the apparent steadiness of her hand. She made her way through the crowd, startled when her hand brushed against a turian's plate-like skin, and got to the bar. One of the barmaids, juggling with drinks Shepard had never even heard of, soon came her way.

"What can I get you?" she said.

"Palaven amaretto."

"Smoked?"

Shepard shook her head.

"Coming right up."

"Jenna, five more of those," an asari waitress ordered, resting her tray on the bar to transfer seven empty shot glasses.

"Seriously?" the barmaid replied. "Are they even alive in there?"

"One of them is definitely redecorating the bathroom right now, but the other two…," the asari smirked. Shepard straightened up slightly to try and see what was going on at the back of the woman's neck. _She's not a woman_. Unconsciously running her hand over the nape of her own neck, Shepard observed the way the dark blue skin folded into unfamiliar curves at the base of the skull. The asari noticed her staring and shot her a quick glance. Shepard looked elsewhere, resting her cheek on her palm, slowly drawing on her cigarette.

"There you go", the barmaid chirped, placing a round glass in front of her. It took a few seconds for the vibrant, amber drink to settle down. Shepard closed her eyes, thinking of a few other Palaven amarettos.

* * *

_Unknown caller ID._ Harkin considered not taking it. He considered turning off the damn thing.

"Harkin. Who is this?" he muttered. The light filtering through the broken slats of the Venetian blinds fell on the empty syringe he was holding.

"_My name is Shepard. Ambassador Udina gave me your number. He- "_

"What? Udina? I don't think so."

"_I'm carrying out an investigation into something you might have come across at C-Sec. Udina told me to contact you because you used to give the Alliance intel."_

"Yeah, _used to_. That bastard hasn't even returned my calls ever since I got fired. Who the hell are you, anyway? How do you know Udina?"

"_He also said you got off easy, and that should you prove reluctant to meet with me, he had more than enough to make sure you returned to C-Sec, and not as an agent."_

"Jesus, what an ass," Harkin mumbled. His palms were starting to sweat. Trying to clear his head, he ran a hand over his face, almost stabbing his left eye with the syringe he'd forgotten to drop. It had been hours since that particular shot, but he still felt like his mind was wading through snow. "What the hell do you want, then?"

"_I can't talk over the phone. Can you meet me in half an hour?"_

"I guess," he said, staring at his feet, idly moving his toes. The drug-induced lightness had faded into a disturbing sense of dissociation, like his body was fragmented into pieces that didn't belong together. "Who are you again? Wait, actually, I don't care. I don't care who you are. Udina can kiss my ass because I sure as hell don't have to kiss his. Let him do whatever he likes. I've been damn useful to the Alliance all this time, and this is how they repay me? I'm out of a job, I'm broke, so what's a little jail time compared to the satisfaction of making sure Udina gets nothing from me, huh?" The woman was silent for a while. "You there?"

"_Meet me at Chora's Den in half an hour. The Alliance is willing to pay up for whatever information you can give me."_

"What, they think I'm a dog, ready to lick anything for scraps?" Harkin barked to buy himself some time to think. What was this all about?

"_Not this time. Chora's Den, half an hour."_

"Fine. Make it one hour, though. Wait, how will I recognize-" The bitch ended the call before he could finish. Harkin sat up on his bed, feeling like shit. He didn't even care about the money anymore. He wanted his job back. If he played his cards right, maybe helping that woman whose name he hadn't even heard would lead Udina to pull some strings to get him reinstated. _Pathetic_. He trudged towards the bathroom and dragged himself under the shower, gradually lowering the temperature until it was cold enough to make him shiver. He stayed like that, head thrown back, swallowing water that couldn't quench his kind of thirst.

Standing in front of the sink, puddles forming around his feet, he opened the cabinet and popped an aspirin as well as a couple of caffeine pills. He caught a glimpse of his own reflection as he closed the small cupboard. Thinning hair, bags under his eyes. At least his job had kept him fit. He looked like he hadn't had a good night's sleep in years. He hadn't. He'd done everything, to excess.

* * *

Shepard winced when she bit her nail a tad too far. Alenko and Williams sat at a small table in one of the crowded booths, close enough to keep a discreet eye on her but not to invade her space. She was getting light-headed from the three Palaven amarettos she'd drunk on an empty stomach, from all the cigarettes she'd burned through. The alcohol warmed up her hands, releasing the tension in her neck muscles. But anxiety was tearing her up so bad she wished she could faint. She had studied the layout of the place. There was a recess in the wall in front of her, on the other side of the bar, one krogan on each side, that led to a door, guarded as well. A VIP lounge, maybe, but she doubted it. Nobody had come in or out in the two hours she'd been there, and despite the krogan' casual demeanor, leaning against the wall, no weapon apparent, she could tell they were scanning the crowd, rotating frequently to keep themselves sharp, she supposed. Unless there was a backdoor somewhere, this was probably the only access to the owner's quarters. Three krogan. A bit much for a single door. Maybe the guy was expecting trouble. Or maybe not, maybe it was all routine security for that kind of place. God, she had no idea what she was doing. She could try and ask one of the bartenders if there was any way to talk to the owner, but she risked getting shunned with no chance of getting back in. She could always get that C-Sec agent's number from Chloe Michel, but apparently, even he thought his channel wasn't safe. She didn't know whether she was getting paranoid, but every stare, every security camera, seemed to follow her, to the point she wasn't sure who, out of Arterius and herself, was chasing the other. There was a sliver of a chance that this guy, Harkin, who had sounded so hammered on the phone she was wondering if he would even make it to Chora's Den, would be able to tell her something she could use to pressure Fist into meeting her, or at least point her in the direction of someone who could, if he'd kept his contact network. It was all so complicated, trying to talk to this club owner, who might have come into contact with a quarian, whose "sensitive information" may or be not have anything to do with-

"Commander fucking Shepard. I'll be damned."

* * *

"Oh my God. Don't look. She's getting hit on," Williams let out with a disbelieving chuckle.

"Single woman in a bar…," Kaidan murmured, grabbing his drink so that he could look in Shepard's direction above the glass. Sure enough, an older man was standing next to the Commander, leaning against the counter. He was dressed casually, the sleeves of his black shirt rolled up to reveal well-toned arms. Kaidan could see his balding head, but not the rest of his face. However, he had a clear view of Shepard's. She was saying something without looking at him. The man leaned in a little closer, practically talking in her ear.

"What a sleazeball," Williams frowned dejectedly. "I'd have slapped him already."

Kaidan narrowed his eyes. Shepard nodded briefly, still not looking at the man. "No, look. I think she was expecting him."

Williams cast a thoughtful look at the Commander. "You may be right, LT," she said after a while. "Shit," she added when the man suddenly turned their way, his eyes searching for something. Kaidan froze when he seemed to point at their table, causing Shepard to look their way. The guy told her something and she got up, walking towards them. The part of Kaidan's mind that wasn't busy trying to figure out what was going on, and whether he should simply go on pretending to be having a drink with a friend without acknowledging anything else, that part couldn't help but notice the way Shepard moved through the crowd. Slow, indolent. She was a little drunk, he could tell. She'd had at least three glasses. Drinking on the job was obviously not something that bothered her, although Kaidan suspected that she had somehow slipped into the part the place offered her to play. There was something open about the way she acted, not adaptability per se, but something… undecided, susceptible to change. When she sat down at the table right next to theirs, Kaidan understood that this was what the man had been pointing at, the recently freed table. Given how packed the place was, the low, wooden tables were practically touching each other. Shepard, who seemed to be tracing the veins of the wood with her fingers, unexpectedly raised her eyes to meet his. Kaidan gave her a small nod in acknowledgement, even though he had no idea what he was supposed to acknowledge.

"Sorry," a gruff voice said above him as something bumped into his chair. He turned around. It was Shepard's companion, trying to get to the seat in front of her, next to Kaidan's. He was carrying two glasses, one containing the same drink the Commander had been enjoying, which he set down before her, the other filled with something dark swirling between ice cubes. Kaidan glanced at the Chief, who was looking the other way, pretending to be absorbed in what was going on onstage. His elbows on the able, the man leaned in, perhaps so that he didn't have to shout to get heard.

"…came up before…," was all Kaidan was able to pick up. He focused until he had successfully isolated both of their voices to be able to follow their conversation. The Alliance Navy, investing heavily in genetic engineering, provided each of their recruits with a basic military enhancement package that, over the years, sharpened eyesight, hearing... the changes were so gradual Kaidan only noticed the difference in situations such as the one he was currently experiencing.

"Did your sector include this place?" Shepard was asking. She still wasn't looking at the man. He, one the other hand, was definitely eyeing her up.

"On and off duty, yeah." he replied.

"Ever met the owner?"

"I know him. Why, is Udina after him?"

"Forget about Udina, I don't work for him," Shepard retorted, settling more comfortably in her chair. "Under what circumstances did you meet Fist?"

"Aren't we sounding like a professional," he said, sarcasm dripping out of his voice. Williams gave Kaidan a quick look, sipping her drink.

"Answer the question."

"This isn't an interrogation, so I suggest you loosen up a bit if you want me to help."

"And I suggest you stop wasting my time. You're right, it's not an interrogation. I don't need to read you your rights, because you have none," she deadpanned. "I will get you to talk, one way or another."

Kaidan tensed up. The man remained silent for a while, but ended up brushing his discomfort aside with a dejected laugh. "Yeah, well, given your history and the fact you made it clear I'm not exactly in a position to bargain, I'll play along. But under all the pomp and statements of principles, Alliance guys like Udina, like you… you're not so different from screw-ups like me. No better. Even your boss, Anderson, right? I know him, you know? We don't get along, he doesn't like it when it's not done by the book. Bet he had one hell of a boner when the brass finally decided they had no more use for me. Well, his record isn't exactly spotless, either. He may have enough medals to look like a Christmas tree, but take them all off and he's no role model, although I'm sure he likes to think so."

Things clicked into place in Kaidan's mind. This guy was the former C-Sec agent Udina had mentioned, Hardin. No, Harkin. A look at Williams told him she had just realized the same thing. Shepard was very still, twirling her glass an inch above the table so that the liquid would catch the light in slow, coppery swirls. She raised her eyes to meet the man's, and Kaidan frowned upon noticing a hint of a smile on her lips. She had this peculiar way of looking at people, like she was casting them a sidelong glance even when they were face to face.

"What?" the man asked.

"Tell me about Fist," she said, still smiling. A smile devoid of irony, it seemed. Kaidan mechanically took a sip of his drink, uneasiness settling in his stomach. Her voice was so calming. He was beginning to feel that the reason why her company was mostly unpleasant wasn't because she was aggressive, openly or otherwise, but because there was something genuinely gentle about the way she spoke, moved, even occupied space, but this gentleness was directed to no one. That was perhaps why, when you were suddenly on the receiving end, her full attention on you for whatever reason, you felt blown out of proportion. He remembered the searing shame he had experienced in Chloe Michel's clinic after his gaffe.

Harkin emptied his drink and whirled around brusquely, his hand raised to signal a waitress to come over, causing Kaidan to promptly strike up a random conversation with Williams about non-existent vacation plans, that they kept going until Harkin resumed his discussion with Shepard, after the waitress had returned with a bottle of batarian ale.

"So. What do you wanna know?" he sighed.

"Did you have some sort of deal with him? You leave him alone, and he gives you a share of… whatever it is he isn't supposed to dabble in."

Harkin snickered. "Yeah, you could say that. Except he dabbles in a lot of things, stuff even I don't want to get involved in. But yeah. I'd make sure that evidence of certain… transactions, never got sniffed out by C-Sec hunting dogs, and in return," he made a vague gesture.

Shepard nodded, raising her glass to her lips. From the corner of his eye, Kaidan watched the liquid go down her throat as she swallowed. Harkin was watching as well. _He sleeps with the whores he arrest_, the ambassador's words echoed in his memory.

"Is his security always that tight? He's got three or four krogan guarding that backdoor," Shepard said quietly.

"Hm," Harkin mumbled, turning in his chair to take a look. "I never kept track but that sounds like a lot, even for him. Why, you planning on raiding his office by yourself?" he snorted.

"I need to talk to him, but I've got very little time and I can't afford to blow it."

"So? You want me to contact him, is that it?"

"Of course not."

"Good. 'Cause he'd have my balls sold to a krogan on the black market if I sicked the Alliance on him." Shepard's frown told Kaidan that the idea of a krogan buying testicles illegally was as foreign to her as it sounded to him. "You didn't know?" Harkin scoffed, gulping down some beer.

"Know what?" Shepard replied, shifting in her seat to get her pack of cigarettes out of her pocket.

"Krogan and their fascination with balls, preferably hairy. Nice, where did you get those?" he asked, gesturing towards the cigarette Shepard was lighting up. The flame underlined the fullness of her lips for a second. Kaidan, all of a sudden, wondered if she was doing this on purpose, the way she drank, the smoking… to turn this guy on. Probably not, this kind of detached refinement seemed to be part of her person, but whether she was aware of it or not, well, it was well-played. Had Kaidan not known her, never interacted with her, had simply seen her as a single woman enjoying a drink and a cigarette… he'd have found her beautiful. She was beautiful.

"Earth."

"Can I try one?" Harkin asked. With a flick of her wrist, Shepard sent the pack sliding over to him, and Kaidan saw Williams roll her eyes discreetly when Harkin's hand lingered as he brushed against Shepard's fingers to take the lighter she was offering. Kaidan suppressed a smirk.

"Do you have a contact that might help?" she said, her face unreadable.

"Someone Fist would be inclined to listen to, should they put in a good word for you? Someone with enough against him to let him know it would be in best interests to meet with you? Someone like that?"

"Someone like that."

"Well, it depends," Harkin said, making himself comfortable and pausing to draw on the dark cigarette. "Depends on how much you're willing to pay this someone. On whether you can guarantee their safety. On why you need to talk to Fist. I'm guessing he's got something you're after. Information, probably?"

Shepard shook her head. "So you can run to Fist as soon as soon as I've told you too much and offer yourself to the highest bidder?" she let out, looking at a salarian waiter balancing a precarious pile of glasses on a tray.

"Jesus, you're a shark," Harkin said with an appreciative shrug.

"And you're desperate," she replied, giving him a piercing look.

"So are you, princess. So are you," he countered. "I might have a name. Can you make it worth my while?"

"Perhaps. What do you want?"

Harkin leaned forwards, crossing his arms on the table. Kaidan saw him wet his lips as if he were searching for the right words. For a wild second, Kaidan thought he was going to ask her to come back to his place with him. "See," he drawled, "I don't care about money. Well, I do, but not right now. What I want is for Anderson's pet soldier to put in a good word for me, get me my job back. I'm a dirty cop, I know it. They all know it. But I fucking need that job, not for the perks, just… I need it, okay?" Now that he was leaning forward, Kaidan could take a better look at him. The man was actually younger than the thinning hair had led him to assume. In his early forties, maybe. Not ugly, but a face that spoke of a life already burned out.

Kaidan didn't expect Shepard to lean in a little closer to the man, their faces inches apart. "Anderson's pet soldier is being court-martialed for insubordination," she whispered, blowing smoke in his face.

"Well, fuck me. What the hell did you do, pull the stick out of his ass?" Harkin grinned.

"I'm not getting you your job back."

Harkin, resting his chin on his forearm, broke eye contact with her and shrugged. "The pay was shit, ayway. I never believed one word of that oath of service. But it kept me going, dragged me out of bed every morning. They really had it in for me at the end, I could have straightened up a bit, long enough for them to get off my back. But after twenty years, " he let out a mirthless chuckle, "I guess I had to see just how far I could go. How low I could sink, more like."

Shepard's smile returned. Not triumphant, just a smile. Kaidan felt his throat constrict, but he didn't have time to analyze why because after a long stretch of silence, Harkin suddenly crossed the two or three inches separating him from Shepard and kissed her. Taken aback, Kaidan glanced at Williams, whose eyes had widened, then back to Harkin and Shepard. He felt his hands go cold and sweaty. She had closed her eyes, and after a few seconds, Harkin drew away from her lips and whispered something in her ear. She nodded and they began to get up. Williams shot Kaidan a panicked look. He was close to feeling the same but warned her not to do anything with a frown and an imperceptible shake of his head. The two were heading through the crowd towards the exit.

"What the hell is she doing?" Williams exclaimed, trying to keep her voice low.

Kaidan hadn't the slightest idea. He didn't get her. He didn't fucking get her. "Calm down, Chief." _Think fast._ "Let's go, we'll follow them at a distance."

"What if we lose them, what if he takes her somewhere? Shouldn't we call the Captain?" she objected, getting up nonetheless.

"We'll see, we haven't lost them yet. Whatever happens from now on is her own doing, maybe she has a plan, maybe she doesn't. All we can do is help if he gets pushy. Hurry, they're almost out."

Kaidan, as he made his way through these alien faces, these alien clothes and smells, felt like he was about to throw up.

* * *

Harkin slowly pulled down her pants, dragging her underwear with them. "Commander Shepard doesn't even have a gun," he smiled, lifting her so that she could sit on one of the crates stocked in the deserted alley behind Chora's Den. He ran his hand along her thigh, the skin pale and smooth under his fingers. Brushed a few locks out of her face. Such open eyes, nothing filtered. He traced her lower lip. Her hand was on his side, he could feel the heat of her palm radiating quietly through his shirt. His breathing quickened and he drew her against him, kissing her neck, feeling the steady pulse under his lips, the subtle smell of her skin behind the ear, nibbling on it a little, her breath warming his own neck and sending chills down his spine. It had been a while since he'd held a woman without paying for it, or without her being stoned out of her mind. Butcher of Torfan. Unbelievable. Had he fantasized about her before meeting her in person, he probably would have gone for something rough. A far cry from the truth, he mused as she draped her arms around his neck. He closed his eyes for a while when her cheek came to rest against his. Slipping his hand under her shirt, he cupped one of her breasts through the fabric of her bra. The skin was always so soft there. Biting his lip, he unzipped his fly. She was so silent.

He hoped he could get it up. Booze, drugs, lack of sleep, all this tended to have that unfortunate effect. Catching up with him at the worst possible time. _Come on_. He drew her into a hungry kiss, to take control, to get himself going, searching for a confirmation that she wanted it as much as he did. She was a disarming kisser, he'd known the moment he'd tried his luck back at the bar. There was nothing reluctant about the way she responded, but she wouldn't let him set the pace, determined to take it slow, way too slow, until each brush of her lips became electrifying. She smelled so fucking good and he was so turned on. When their tongues finally met, he couldn't take it anymore and entered her. She eased him into her by lying on her back. The feel of her legs around him, the warmth of her intimacy, this perfect fit. A moan escaped his lips, not one of those grunts that came with the thrusting, but the out-of-breath, high-pitched, painful sigh of pleasure spinning out of control. The red light from the alley filtered through his closed eyelids, colors dancing faster and faster. The kiss deepened, and it was this, he would later come to understand, that prevented him from going all the way. It deepened until there was nothing else but that kiss, until he realized he wasn't even hard anymore, like he'd forgotten something along the way. Weariness, spreading through his muscles, through his mind, turned what should have been the ultimate humiliation into vague uneasiness, mingled with embarrassment.

"I can't," he muttered, pulling himself out. He almost apologized. But he'd never apologized for anything, and he wouldn't start now. The same thing had happened to him once before, with a whore. He'd been so drunk, that night. The girl had said the words she probably knew by heart, _it's okay, don't worry, it happens_. Shepard said nothing. She pushed herself up, pulled her pants back on, giving him that look that betrayed neither frustration nor disappointment. Harkin wondered if she had even been expecting anything in the first place. He felt awful. Relieved. He took a deep breath to quiet his mind, zipping his fly up.

"What are you gonna do now?" he asked.

She shrugged, running a hand through her hair. It seemed just long enough to be tied back, and Harkin briefly wondered what she would look like if she did. "I don't know. Fist was my only lead."

"What happens if you come up empty?"

"I don't know", she repeated pensively, her tired eyes focused on something distant.

"There's actually someone you could talk to," he sighed. She gave him a tranquil look he chose to take as an invitation to continue. "I have no idea if he'll be able to help, but nothing major goes on on the Citadel without him knowing it. He's a volus named Barla Von, works as a financial adviser on the Presidium. Very good, very well-connected. Everybody knows he trades information as well, he's actually one of the Shadow Broker's top agents. Even C-Sec uses him, although those hypocrites would never admit it. He's not cheap, but it might save you some time if he's got what you're looking for."

"Should I call to make an appointment or go directly?" Shepard asked, leaning against a crate.

"I'd say you could go, but…," Harkin trailed off, checking his omni-tool. "It's too late for today, it's the middle of the night on the Presidium. Big shots like fatty Barla or her majesty the Consort need their beauty sleep, so the Financial District goes pretty quiet six hours a day."

"You know the Consort?" Shepard inquired, and for the first time, Harkin detected a hint of interest in her voice.

"Not personally. Why?"

"I received a message earlier today," she replied, "from an asari who introduced herself as one of Consort's 'acolytes'. She said this Sha'ira would like to meet me. What do you know about her?"

"Your reputation really does precede you, doesn't it," Harkin commented, more impressed than he was willing to let on. "She is… what you want her to be, I guess. Adviser, whore, shrink, you name it. She has the ear of every diplomat, politician, business magnate, basically anyone who can afford her services. She must be doing it right because most of them are hooked, and she's rumored to be very influential in high circles. Never heard of her contacting people, though. I'd go, if I were you, if only to see what all the fuss is about."

"Thanks," Shepard nodded. "Goodbye, Harkin," she added, already walking away.

Hearing his own name produced a curious effect on Harkin, a tightness in his chest, like something was trying to fit in there but couldn't find the room. "Where are you staying?" he asked, regretting it instantly.

She looked at him over her shoulder, but kept walking. "A hotel, I guess."

All sorts of replies flashed through his mind. He said nothing, watching her disappear.


End file.
